Shuffle
by Jessa4865
Summary: One case starts a domino chain of changes.
1. Chapter 1

Shuffle  
Jezyk  
Spoilers: I'm never any good at these, so let's just say through Perverted.  
Disclaimer: Not mine. No, seriously.

Part One

He'd always wondered, his whole life, if it really was possible, anywhere on Earth, for it to be so quiet as to actually hear a pin drop. As someone who was privy to many an uncomfortable silence during his career, Don Cragen had determined that in the case that such a quiet existed, it was most certainly not possible anywhere in New York City.

And fuck if he wasn't wrong.

It was so fucking quiet in that room that he could hear a damn pin just laying there. He dared not breathe, unless, of course, he was answering a question. He sighed very, very quietly, completely unsure why he was even bothering with the motions. Although he'd never had a particular bent toward violence, he suddenly appreciated Elliot's approach to most anything. Had the younger man been in his shoes, he wouldn't have bothered bending over and taking it with a polite smile and appropriate answers. No, Elliot would have hauled off and decked at least one of the pricks until Olivia managed to pull him away.

The rueful snicker that escaped was painfully loud, drawing the stare of the deputy chief prick. Fitting that thinking of them made him laugh. It was due to them, and one hell of a fucked up case, that he was there. They might as well be the reason within the reason he was getting in trouble too.

Johnson, second from the left, looked up sharply. "Is something funny, Captain Cragen?"

Fighting back a smile at the idea of how Stabler would respond, he mutely shook his head. He swallowed the bile that rose. At least Stabler would have gone down fighting. Cragen, as well as the panel of pricks, knew exactly how this was going to end. But rather than raising a fuss, Cragen had every intention of going out quietly with his tail between his legs. After forty-five years on the NYPD payroll, he was hardly well-suited to find anything else to do. He'd earned his pension and he had every intention of collecting it. Not to mention that he was praying his cooperation would spare more trouble for his squad. He didn't want to take anyone down with him.

That was the whole point of falling on his sword, after all.

Keil, sitting on Johnson's left, finally pulled his nose out of the file and fixed what might have been a steely glare, had it not been diluted by stylish, completely metro reading glasses, on Cragen. "Captain Cragen, regarding the misplaced psychological evaluations of Detectives Benson and Stabler..."

Cragen swallowed hard, wondering again why he was bothering.

* * * * *

He knew as soon as they walked into his office. The psychiatrist reminded him of a crocodile. His appointed escort from 1PP wasn't much better, though his uniform prevented being greeted with a snarl. They were trouble. Or they would make trouble. Or they would find trouble. The timing, less than four days after one utter fuck-up of a case, was too perfect for coincidence. It was a witch hunt, that much was certain. The only uncertain piece was who they were after. The brass, the DA's office, IAB, everyone recently, seemed to have a hard on for anyone at all connected to Special Victims. And with their latest case, there were so many reasonable possibilities for who would shoulder the blame Cragen couldn't even contemplate them.

After listening to the bullshit explanation, Cragen led the henchmen into the bullpen.

"Listen up, people, everyone needs to schedule a review with Dr. Felton by the end of today." He stopped short of insisting on compliance because he knew someone would try to worm their way out of it and he saw no reason to highlight the fact that his staff only listened to him when they felt like it. Besides, he knew every member of his squad was mentally fucked in one way or another. No one perfectly sane could survive there for long. It was only natural that they balked at the idea of someone crawling into their messy psychological states. They had enough shit to deal with.

As expected, he watched them make eye contact - something he'd noticed they'd stopped doing in the previous four days - briefly before Elliot started to complain. "Seriously, how many psych evals do we have to waste our time on?"

Olivia joined in, their tag-teaming well ingrained after so many years, despite the trouble the case had apparently caused. "Eventually they're hoping we'll go nuts from having our sanity questioned repeatedly."

Dr. Felton asked for their names, referring to some list on his little clipboard. "The last time either of you sat for an official review was nearly five years ago."

Again, the pair exchanged a look, confused enough by the information that they forgot they weren't speaking to each other. Hell, for that skill alone Cragen was tempted to ask the man to join his squad.

Unfortunately, they were checking with one another and so missed the way Cragen was shaking his head at them.

"That's wrong. We had-" She faltered for a moment, finally catching sight of Cragen's distress.

"We just saw Dr. Hendricks. What, two, three years ago?" Elliot had stepped in and finished his partner's thought before he too noticed Cragen.

Dr. Felton looked at his notes again. "I'm afraid that her conclusions were not included in your personnel files." He turned to Cragen. "Do you recall anything about this?"

Cragen met the doctor's eyes only for a moment and lied through his teeth. "The paperwork should be in their jackets." Of course it wasn't. The paperwork was sitting in a landfill somewhere, having been fed through his shredder as soon as he'd received Hendricks' official documentation.

Because he was deliberately not looking at the pair of interlopers, he watched the pair of detectives. Ever skilled at reading people, Elliot recognized that something was very wrong with the situation. He turned his eyes to his partner, checking to see if she knew something he didn't. When she only stared back in uncertainty, both of them shrugged slightly and turned to check with the only person who actually knew what was going on.

Cragen felt terribly guilty because they really hadn't seen it coming. Perhaps they should have expected it, but really, Cragen knew they couldn't have. They weren't that stupid, he knew, but they were that blind. Because he'd covered for them. Because he'd kept the results from them. Because he'd let them think they'd passed the review with Hendricks with flying colors when they hadn't. Not even close. They'd failed miserably. And how.

And so he could only feel bad, knowing the axe was about to drop on them while they didn't have a clue. He'd done what he could, kept them together as long as possible, longer than anyone else would have. The only thing he truly wished he could have changed about his actions would have been that he never gave them a warning.

Not that they would have heeded it anyway.

* * * * *

And so he sat there uncomfortably, waiting, watching, as the four-person panel of pricks, whose conclusions were most definitely already drawn, who clearly had never earned the sort of respect that led to a bond like that of Elliot and Olivia, read the report Rebecca Hendricks had been all to happy to re-fax to the department. Although they were glued to the pages, Cragen wasn't fooled in the slightest. They'd read the recommendation before. They'd had it for nearly a week before they'd scheduled the crucifixion, giving them ample time to absorb, to process, the devastating, career-ending information. And while they'd been digesting the feast they'd been seeking for years, Cragen had been waiting to see just who would wind up being the sacrificial lamb.

He'd been hoping that it would be him. The loss of his job wouldn't be nearly so awful for him; he didn't define himself exclusively by his title. He knew that wasn't the case for the detectives. He also knew that if they were to get the blame, they would turn on each other. They always did when their relationship got them in hot water.

As though their fierce loyalty would go away if they were pissed off at each other.

As though they were any less in love with each other simply because someone had stated the obvious.

Johnson, the one who was obviously out to get him, cleared his throat, shot a look at Keil to shut him up, and then smiled in an entirely unfriendly manner. "I find it quite curious, Captain Cragen, that this particular item is the only thing missing from the files of Detectives Benson and Stabler, and that it was missing from both files. Don't you also find that odd?"

Cragen drew a silent breath and held the man's stare. He refused to fall victim to such obvious baiting. He refused to voice the question of how could they possibly know that nothing else was missing. He allowed himself to gloat for a moment, recalling all the very many things he'd never deemed necessary to write down, if only due to his aversion to paperwork. The fact was whoever inherited the two, either alone or together, wasn't going to have any idea what he was getting into. The brass could think he'd mishandled the pair all they liked; he knew he'd done the best job possible and had earned the best results possible. The only thing that kept Elliot and Olivia in line, besides their desire to never get in enough trouble to be split up, was loyalty. He had their loyalty. His successor would be Benedict Arnold in their eyes. God himself couldn't get them to behave for someone they didn't trust.

After what he decided was a reasonable pause, he responded with a complete lie. "Perhaps the paperwork was misfiled together somewhere." Yeah, like the landfill.

Keil took off his glasses and fixed Cragen with a hard glare. "Regardless of any apparent misfiling, there is a major concern here. You had documented evidence of two detectives being compromised. Why did you continue to let them work in the same unit, let alone as partners?"

They were finished beating around the bush. It was time for the questions Cragen didn't have to lie about. He believed his actions were completely defensible. He carefully looked at the panel, one at a time. "Dr. Hendricks did not recommend that I split them up. In fact, in a face-to-face meeting, she specifically advised against it."

Lindell, the sole woman, seated on the far right spoke up for the first time since introducing herself. "You must have been seeing behavioral patterns that raised questions to order the review."

Cragen took a deep breath and admitted the truth. He knew it wouldn't win him any brownie points, but he didn't see the point in making something up. "I wanted to know if they were having an affair. I would have reassigned them if that had been the case. But they were not, according to Dr. Hendricks. Therefore, I saw no reason to punish them for something they weren't doing."

Jacobs, the fourth member of the panel of pricks, shook his head. "Dr. Hendricks' conclusion states clearly and in no uncertain terms that their effectiveness as police officers is compromised in the field. What part of that did you think meant they should remain partners?"

He thought of Olivia then, of the pissed-off glare that she would have worn in his shoes, and tried to channel some of the intense superiority she had when challenged. "Even compromised, they are the best team I've ever worked with in forty-five years."

Johnson turned one of the pages and began reading out an upsetting list of complaints and corrective actions taken.

And sadly, it was only at the mention of multiple excessive force inquiries that Cragen could be sure whose file it was.

But it only served to piss him off because he knew how hard they worked and how much they cared to get so out of control over their cases. He interrupted, unwilling to keep listening to the prick beat a dead horse. "Detective Benson is practically running a rape crisis center through her cell phone. She can convince the most reluctant victims to face their attackers in court. Detective Stabler has sacrificed watching his children grow up so he can put pedophiles behind bars. No one gets past him in interrogation."

Cragen was rarely one to show emotion, but he was shaking by the time he finished speaking. No one went after his squad in front of him. No one questioned their ability or dedication. His squad was the closest thing he had to family, just like Olivia, which he recognized was probably the reason he'd protect her to the end. And the fact that Elliot felt the same about taking care of her garnered him the same protection from his boss.

Lindell closed the file in front of her and clasped her hands together on top of it, indicating that she wasn't interested in further discussion. "Captain Cragen, do you have any final comments to make in defense of your actions regarding Detectives Benson and Stabler?"

He was out of time and chances, he realized. It didn't matter what he said, but he tried nonetheless. "If I transferred them, no one would be capable of doing the work and getting the results they get together. Special Victims is a different animal than other departments. Victims will suffer without the continued work of the detectives in my unit." Because really, in the end, it wasn't about saving himself.

Johnson glanced quickly to the pricks on the left and right, apparently reaching a telekinetic consensus. "That's not your problem anymore."

For a second, he feared his heart had stopped beating. He wouldn't survive getting fired. After being a cop all his life, there was nothing else he was suited to do. And no one would be dumb enough to hire him as a security guard if he were dumb enough to apply for it. He needed his pension. He'd be on the street without it.

Johnson stood up, cuing the rest of the pricks to gather their papers and do the same. "We'll be expecting your resignation by the end of the week." He turned to leave, but paused and looked back at Cragen. "Effective immediately, of course."

Stunned mute, Cragen nodded his understanding before he stood to leave. He'd known it was coming. He'd accepted the blame on purpose. He'd known his last suspension was it, that he was on the short list. But he'd thought he'd have a couple of months to get used to it. He never would have guessed it would only be a few weeks.

But he should have known, he realized belatedly, because once there's blood in the water, there's no postponing the feeding frenzy.

When he returned to his office, he still couldn't speak. He saw the curious looks that quickly turned anxious at his lack of reassurance. As he sat down at his desk to write his resignation under duress, he decided it had all been Lake's fault. The ass had barely been considered a part of the squad when he'd lost it, an action which certainly brought the scrutiny of the brass to all of them. It was so unfair. If they were going down, he figured, one of them should at least be responsible.

His eyes fell on Olivia and Elliot, who weren't even hiding their concern. With what they'd been through together, winding up co-dependent and in love was the least horrible outcome, and it was the closest they'd ever get to happy, he was sure. Which was why he'd let them be whenever he possibly could. But it wasn't up to him anymore. They were done; he knew it. Getting rid of them would be the first assignment for his replacement.

And suddenly, he was glad he was leaving. Because he wouldn't have to do it. Because he wouldn't have to see it. Because he wasn't sure they'd survive it.

He shook his head in disbelief.

One really fucked up case had brought the whole house of cards tumbling down. At least, he thought with a resigned sigh as he started typing meaningless words to his superiors, someone else would have to write it up.


	2. Chapter 2

Part Two

It was nearly nine at night. Normally, she would have just been getting in, probably exhausted and leaving a pile of work behind her that would prevent her from getting any rest and ultimately result in her returning to the office in slightly worse shape than she'd left in.

But it wasn't normally. At least it wasn't the old normally. It was an entirely new normally that was anything but normal.

Instead of her pounding head overflowing with the details of her, their, latest case, she was sitting in her living room, staring at the wall and wondering just what it was that regular people did when they weren't at work. Because while she understood that homicides deserved to be solved, she lacked the obsessive attachment to them. Without feeling personally responsible for solving them, the cases were simply cases. The faces of the victims, though still undoubtedly horrific in their own right, didn't taunt her. They didn't torture her every thought. They were just victims. Their pain was over. Sad, but not all-consuming.

She wondered if that made her a terrible human being.

Perhaps, she decided, Special Victims had simply ruined her.

Out of instinct, which apparently had yet to catch up with reality, she reached for her phone. But there was no one to call. Elliot was out of the question. And her new partner, well he could hardly be expected to understand that she needed to sit in a dark, slimy bar and absolutely not talk about it.

With an angry growl directed equally at herself and at her partner, ex-partner, she mentally corrected, she remembered that Elliot probably wouldn't have understood either. Years ago, maybe, but not anytime recently, not anytime she could really recall. They hadn't really even been friends. They'd simply known each other so long she didn't know what else to call it. Sure, once there had been something there, some special rapport between them, maybe even a bond, that may have only existed in her head. Whatever it had or hadn't been, it was nothing anymore. Not since that night. Not since that fucked up case. And she wasn't about to wax philosophical over it. Elliot certainly wasn't.

Bored, and somewhat concerned that she was going to wax philosophical over it anyway, Olivia hurried herself out the door. She knew exactly what she needed, and she decided that having another person with her while she sulked into her beer wasn't the important part. In her mind, the important part was the beer. Or maybe the important part was the sulking. Either way, she didn't need Elliot to do it. She didn't need him to work. She didn't fucking need him at all.

And maybe, with a couple of beers and possibly several shots, she might actually start to believe it.

And believing it was important because she really couldn't ever face the man again.

* * * * *

Her head was still spinning, despite the doctors' assurances that the drug was long gone. The drug wasn't necessarily the problem; no, really, the issue was what the drug made her do. And even beyond the what and the why was the who. She had to work with him. Jesus, how was she supposed to even look at him?

It made her wonder why anyone would willingly ingest drugs. She didn't have to think hard. She knew why. She'd experienced it. And she could easily understand why people would eagerly cast responsibility aside just to feel so damn good for a little while.

And that was why she'd done it, really. Because she felt so damn good and she wanted to keep feeling good and fuck if she hadn't wanted to share the wealth of feeling so fucking good with her partner.

He hadn't exactly been complaining about her stroke of brilliant selflessness.

Just the thought of what she'd done sent a flash of heat boiling through her veins. She'd wanted to do it. She had. But she never actually would have without chemical intervention. Unfortunately, she was left in desperate need of chemical intervention to ever look her partner in the eye again. In fact, just remembering it, that she'd fucking done it with no particular reason or warning or excuse, was so embarrassing she couldn't even face her locker. Her head was hanging in shame as she contemplated her next move. She had to show her face in the bullpen soon or someone would-

The telltale creek of the door hinges mocked her.

- check on her. She prayed with all the strength she could muster that it wasn't him. Yet she knew it was, even before the overpowering scent of his cologne reached her nostrils and clouded her already fuzzy mind.

She wanted to crawl into her locker and hide. She wanted to disappear. She wanted him to disappear too.

He was going to say something, that was why he was there, but she didn't know what he could possibly say, how he could be any less mortified than she was. He might say they should talk about it, even if neither of them wanted to. He might gently remind her that he was married, a thought that hadn't occurred to either of them at the time. He might talk about work, ignoring the elephant altogether. He might bring up those stupid words she'd offered him, high as a kite, to explain herself. He might mention the immutable fact that while she'd been instigating something really fucking stupid, a young woman was being raped a few feet away.

Oh _god_.

At least concentrating on the mortification kept her from acknowledging the guilt.

"Go away." She couldn't look at him. If he chose to mention Laura, it would be the death of her. Not just because of the guilt. No, she wasn't that altruistic. If he was able to ignore what had happened and just go about work business with her, it would break her heart. Fuck her heart. It would fucking break her. It would absolutely kill her.

"What in god's name were you thinking?"

She thanked her lucky stars. He hadn't gone for the soft, concerned approach. That would have been unfuckingbearable too. She turned around, her body facing him while her eyes remained on the floor. "I wasn't thinking. I was high."

"So was I. That's not an excuse."

Pissed at him for pretending that he'd been the consummate professional, she met his eyes in a challenge. "You didn't stop me."

He laughed like it was the most preposterous thing she could have said, but his eyes turned away in a silent admission that he had, in fact, been there too. "Good luck finding a man who would have."

She refused to give him the point even though she knew he was right. If he expected her to have had control over herself, then it was perfectly reasonable for her to have expected the same of him. "You should have tried."

He walked away without answering.

* * * * *

Two beers hadn't really helped and setting foot in the dive bar without a strong, intimidating man at her side scared her away from shots of hard liquor. Still, she was hoping a third beer might do the trick, even though she didn't have the faintest clue what trick it was that she was expecting the alcohol to perform.

Because there sure as hell wasn't a drink on the planet strong enough to erase the loneliness that she felt sitting in the booth, staring across the table and not meeting the questioning eyes of her partner. Ex-partner.

That part wasn't any closer to sinking in after a few drinks.

Clearly, a couple weeks wasn't quite enough time to get over a relationship that had spanned nearly fifteen years.

Maybe she just needed a few more drinks.

Halfway through the bottle, Olivia watched a group of men pushing through the doors. She knew better than to have more than three drinks in such a short time without someone to make sure she got home safe, and so she watched the first few guys to distract herself. They were already at the bar before the rest of their friends had finished straggling inside. They were cops. She could tell, regardless of the fact that most of the patrons who frequented that particular hole in the wall were. It was just something in the way they carried themselves or perhaps it was the way years of frustration showed in the weary set of their shoulders.

Traditionally weary or not, though, there was something different, something light about them. They were celebrating, Olivia realized. Maybe a collar. Maybe a verdict. She knew that she'd had a couple of those not-awful occasions over the years, but she couldn't put her finger on any specific memory. It was a depressing thought.

Most of her job-related memories were from Special Victims, and now all of them were steeped in pain and loss and humiliation. Special Victims was where she'd spent most of her career. Special Victims was where she'd shone. Special Victims was where she'd found a niche for herself for the first time in her life. Special Victims was where she belonged.

With her beer getting painfully close to empty, she forced the thoughts from her head. She was trying to forget, to move on, and that was never going to happen if she kept thinking about it. And if she kept thinking of Special Victims, she'd invariably think about him. And that wasn't a good idea.

Especially not when she was drunk. Drunk was almost like high and she might suddenly decide to call him and tell him that she really wasn't a bit sorry for what she'd done, that she'd happily do it again if he was interested, and that she missed him. Fuck, a couple more beers and she might tell him she loved him. Again. And remembering how well that had gone over, it wasn't something she wanted to repeat.

She turned off her phone, hoping it would serve to remind her that she shouldn't use it. Then she fixed her stare on the bar and tried to determine if she could walk that far without tripping.

"Looks like you could use a refill."

There was a beer floating in front of her face and she chose to concentrate on that rather than on the disembodied voice.

Because the odds were against the voice truly being disembodied. Which meant that her partner – damn, she needed to remember the ex part – and the last person on Earth she should be allowed to speak to while she was inebriated was standing right next to her.

"Is this a private party or can I join in?"

Finally deciding she needed the beer more than her dignity, she reached for it, nearly jumping out of her skin when her fingers brushed his. Half the bottle disappeared in her first swallow.

Sliding into the seat opposite her, he smirked. "Maybe I should have brought you a couple."

Her eyes locked on her beer. It was shaking. It took longer than it should have for her to notice that it was actually her that was shaking. When had the man she'd spent fifteen years with suddenly started making her so damn nervous?

Oh _yeah_.

She slowly dragged her eyes up to meet his. They were still that startling bright blue that still took her breath away. Unlike the last few times she'd seen him, however, they weren't hooded and angry and accusing. He just looked like Elliot, like the man who'd been her only source of comfort for as long as she could remember. The familiarity was dangerously inviting.

Another long sip of beer gave her the courage to speak. "What are you doing here?"

He sighed and appeared disappointed. "At least I'm not getting the silent treatment anymore. I guess that's an improvement." His head inclined toward the group gathered at the bar. "We finally nailed somebody they've been after for months. They wanted to celebrate."

She didn't see the point, not really. There would just be another bastard happy to fill the void. "Then go celebrate." If he went away, she could go back to her drunken melancholia.

"What are you doing here?" He was trying to draw her out. Maybe he was done blaming her and actually wanted to talk about it.

Fuck that.

She snorted and motioned at the collection of empties she'd amassed. "What does it look like I'm doing?"

His eyes were holding hers, his certainty revealing that he knew exactly what she was doing. His verbal assurance was unnecessary. "It looks like you're trying to forget something."

She stared back, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing her discomfort. "Not something. Someone."

The remark seemed to deflate him, his shoulders sagging as his eyes fell. "Well, I'd ask you to let me know if it works, but I imagine that would defeat the purpose."

"You being here kind of defeats the purpose too." She picked at the label of her beer for a moment before her gaze climbed back to his. "Not that it was working anyway."

"Good."

"Good?"

His lips curved into a smile. "I'm glad it's not working."

She didn't bother inquiring; she didn't need to. He enjoyed being under her skin, probably even more so because she'd admitted she didn't like it. "Why are you still here?"

"Because I'm not trying to forget anything." The smile was gone, but his eyes were still dancing.

It pissed her off that he'd apparently gotten over everything so quickly and that he wasn't even bitter about it. "You sure about that?" Because, really, she knew there was at least one thing he didn't want to remember.

"Yeah, I am."

The alcohol was getting the better of her. She knew it, and yet remained powerless as she took another sip. Rather than replacing the bottle, she held it close to her mouth, her tongue darting out to circle the top even as her brain, the part that was still functioning, screamed at her to stop.

She held back her victorious smirk as long as she possibly could, watching him widen his eyes and swallow hard. She waited until he ducked his head with red cheeks before she let herself chuckle. "Yeah, that's what I thought. You tell Kathy yet?"

He chewed on his lip for a moment, keeping his beautiful eyes averted, giving her the delightful knowledge that she was under his skin too if only for one reason. "Since you're obviously not in the mood to talk, I'll leave you to your forgetting." He stood up, his body seeming to move so quickly Olivia knew she was far drunker than she'd thought.

Unable to watch him walking away from her for quite possibly the last time, she looked down. Her phone was sitting there, the blank screen reminding her that she'd turned it off for a reason. She remembered not wanting to call him. But that hardly seemed useful anymore.

"Hey, El?"

He hadn't moved far, as though he was hoping she'd call him back. "Yeah?"

She didn't know what to say. She didn't know how to pick which of the million things rolling through her mind was the right one to fix things. "I'm-" She'd almost said she was sorry, but she wasn't. And then it was there again, falling out of her mouth exactly as she'd feared it would, as fast as it had the first time. "I love you."

And just like before, his face registered utter shock and confusion.

And just like before, he resolved it by walking away from her.


	3. Chapter 3

Part Three

The woman was out of her mind. He'd always suspected that under her calm, collected exterior, Olivia was just as pissed off and angry at the world as he was. He'd always thought that she amassed every slight the universe threw at her and, like him, used the collection as an excuse to hate the world a little bit more.

But no, she was nothing like him.

Under her tough cop persona, Olivia remained innocent and naïve. So much so that she believed in happy endings and that love conquered all.

Love didn't conquer shit. It only complicated the fuck out of life.

Love sure as hell didn't help him explain to his wife how he'd been demoted to investigating robberies. Love didn't do anything about the fact that he could barely crawl out of bed every morning to face his life anymore. Love didn't change how he hated the job he'd once loved. Love didn't make his days without seeing the only person in his life who didn't need something from him any more tolerable.

No, love just fucking hurt.

And fuck if it didn't make him so fucking weak he hated himself. Because it had been love – need, desire and drugs aside – that let him ruin everything. Love meant guilt. And he already had more guilt than he knew what to do with.

But he couldn't really blame love. No, it had been all him. He'd fucking ruined everything, all on his own, without anyone or anything else to blame, just like his dad always said he would. Fucking son of a bitch had been right about him all along. Elliot Stabler was a royal fucking screw up who never should have been born. Everything he touched turned to shit. Everyone he touched got hurt. There was nothing in the world he couldn't destroy just by trying to save it.

Like Laura. Poor Laura Scott. He'd been there to protect her, all women like her. If only he hadn't been such a fuck up, he wouldn't have been standing there, thinking it was the best fucking night of his life, across the room from the under-aged girl with her sister's ID while she was being raped.

Like Cragen. The man had quietly accepted the responsibility for Elliot's own fuck-up that night. Elliot didn't know what had earned him such loyalty. He'd certainly caused Cragen more headaches than he deserved. And yet the man had retired, silently claiming he was somehow the reason for Laura's rape.

Like Kathy. She'd tried all of her adult life to be the loving, supportive wife she thought he wanted. She took the brunt of his anger – when he was actually home - letting him scream at her for asking innocuous questions like if he'd be at his daughter's soccer game over the weekend. For nearly a quarter of a century, she'd been trying to win his attention and Elliot had never found the words to tell her that he wasn't in love with her, that he never actually had been. Hell, as much as he loved his kids, he was still pissed off at the young, love-blinded Kathy who swore she couldn't possibly get pregnant that night.

Like his kids. Every time one of them pointed out what an utter let-down he'd been as a father, he couldn't help but wonder if they wouldn't have been better off without him. Maybe if he'd been killed on the line, they could have grown up with his benefits and the belief that he would have been a great dad if only he'd lived.

Like Olivia.

Oh, dear god.

Olivia.

He couldn't remember all the millions of ways he'd hurt her. And the poor thing didn't have the sense to stop coming back for more. Of all the many things he'd magnificently fucked up in his life, what he'd done to Olivia was the number one thing he really wished he might have changed. Not only had he ruined her career, which would have been bad enough, but he'd broken her, reduced the strongest woman he'd ever laid eyes on to drunkenly shouting her love for him across a crowded bar full of cops.

What the hell was wrong with him?

* * * * *

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Captain Stephens might have been yelling at both of them, but the man's eyes were locked on him. Almost like he knew exactly what had happened. Almost like he knew it was all Elliot's fault.

Like always, she spoke up, trying to shield him. "Captain, Elliot and I were both under the influence-"

"Shut up!"

The new captain's harsh anger made Elliot's temper flare. He wanted to pound the man for talking to her like that. But he couldn't. And he kind of wanted to scream the same thing at her. She never learned that by trying to protect him, she only brought scrutiny on them, on why she was trying to protect him, which always wound up highlighting their relationship.

Which actually would answer the captain's question regarding what was wrong with them.

"What the hell were you doing while a seventeen-year-old girl was being raped not ten yards from you?"

He'd been having the fucking time of his fucking life.

At least Olivia kept her mouth shut that time. If only she'd had the same instinct that night.

The captain threw the case file on his new, clean desk. "You know what? I don't even care. I don't know how Don put up with you two for so long, but your free ride ends now. I've got this shithole of a department to straighten out and I bet this first step will go a long way towards that goal."

He paused for a moment, an evil gleam coming to his eyes. "Stabler, you're heading downstairs. O'Bryan is expecting you tomorrow morning. Benson, the three-two needs a body in homicide and they're tickled pink to get you." He thrust a paper at each of them, unconcerned they were both too stunned to notice. "As far as I'm concerned, you're both extremely lucky you've still got your fucking shields. Now get the fuck out of my office."

One foot moved in front of the other, carrying him back to his desk. Except that it wasn't his desk anymore. He stared at the paper he had no recollection of accepting. His official transfer. Downstairs. To work with the rest of the shitheads who couldn't find their asses with both hands. At least Olivia was only getting bumped sideways. Which, he understood, had to be every bit as devastating to her.

He could feel her eyes on him. He knew, despite the awkwardness of the last week and a half, that she was looking to him for reassurance. She wanted him to tell her that everything was going to be ok. But he couldn't say that. He knew nothing was ok. He knew it probably never would be. He couldn't lie to her.

He couldn't tell her the truth either. He wouldn't be able to stand the heartbreak he'd see in her eyes.

Ever since she'd opened her mouth and said those three stupid words to him, he'd realized how very much she depended on him. He couldn't give her what she wanted and they both knew it. She'd put him in a horrible position by saying it, practically demanding that he disappoint her, undoubtedly knowing that doing so would kill him too. They both needed to stand on their own. Or collapse. Whatever they were going to do, they couldn't do it together anymore.

"El?"

He could hear the tears in her choked voice and he couldn't look at her. He couldn't bear to see her pain, pain that she wouldn't have suffered if he hadn't fucked up that night. It was for her own good that he didn't look at her, no matter how much it hurt him to ignore her. But he knew he didn't have the strength to resist her for long, he knew he'd give in if she kept trying, he always did.

So he just walked away.

* * * * *

Her words echoed in his head as he walked, loud and clear and painfully real. He wanted them to stop repeating. He wanted them to go away. No, not go away. He wanted them to have never existed. It was hard enough to love her for all those years, knowing full well that he could never have her, never touch her. But to know that she'd felt it too, to hear her say it, to realize that he could have had her, it was too much. He couldn't give her what she deserved. But apparently, he could have given her what she wanted. Because all she wanted was whatever he could give her.

Like that night. That god-awful fucking wonderful night.

She would have been happy with that. But he'd thought she wanted more, of course she did, and he'd refused to let her have anything because it hadn't occurred to him that she would have settled.

His hurried footsteps turned into a full-on sprint, his body trying to outrun her face, her words.

She loved him.

She fucking _loved_ him.

Kathy was stuck with him. Too many years. Too many kids. Too many financial entanglements. To get rid of him had required more resources than she'd had, and so, she'd given up and invited him back.

But Olivia wanted him. Not the way Kathy had when she was young and barely knew him and had no idea of what a future with him would be like. Olivia knew him, inside and out; she'd learned the bad stuff before the good. After years at his side, she knew exactly how he'd respond to every situation and how bad his temper was and that he would never confide in her because he never confided in anyone. And she still fucking wanted him.

She fucking loved him.

And, like the asshole he was, he just kept hurting her more. She didn't care that he was just going to keep doing it. She didn't know he was trying not to hurt her by denying her. She didn't care. She just wanted him, fucking flaws and all.

The icy aired stabbed at his lungs as he tried to suck in enough to keep running. Maybe it was possible to run so far, so fast, that his life would just fade away. Maybe he could wipe the slate clean and start over as someone else. Except he couldn't erase her. He couldn't leave her behind.

The tears left freezing streaks on his face as he turned around. He was going to hurt her either way, he knew it. But he figured he might as well let her have what she wanted. He'd never been able to deny her, not for long.

He'd run farther than he'd realized and it pissed him off. He wanted to get back there, to talk to her before she got so drunk she forgot. He wanted her to remember that he came back to her. He wished he could run back, but his body wouldn't cooperate anymore. His legs were shaking from the exertion. His hands were numb from the cold. His lungs were still heaving from the last race.

As he hurried, he imagined how crushed she must have been, watching him walk away after having revealed so much of herself once again. He was such a fucking screw up. But if she wanted him, she could have him. He pulled his coat tighter against the wind and willed his feet to move faster.

Someone fell in step beside him, and Elliot couldn't be bothered to look over at him. Probably just a bum, trying to hit him up for some change.

"Hey, man, you must be having a bad night."

Elliot kept moving, feeling like he was having that dream where his legs were too heavy to lift. He couldn't get back to her fast enough, the frustration causing more tears to spill over his cheeks. It might have been his last chance. He might have already blown it. But he was trying. Damn it, he was trying.

Olivia, I'm coming. He hoped in her drunken haze she might hear him.

"It's about to get a lot worse."

Before he could realize the man was still there, matching his rushed stride, before he could make sense of the threat, he saw the sidewalk flying up at him. He was turning, twisting, unsure what was happening until he felt the cold cement through the back of his shirt.

The bastard had stolen his fucking coat right off his fucking back.

Son of a bitch.

He had every intention of teaching the punk a lesson about fucking with a cop as soon as he caught up with him.

But he couldn't seem to get up. His body was still lost in the fog of racing to Olivia. He could barely lift his head, and when he did, it was only for a moment before it was so heavy that it flopped back to the ground.

His shirt was wet from the rain and he almost laughed at how ridiculous he was going to look when Olivia saw him.

Olivia.

Shit, she might still be waiting for him.

Shit, she didn't know he was coming back.

He should have called her. He should still call her. He looked up at the sky, recalling clearly that his phone was in his coat pocket.

Of all the luck. He closed his eyes, thinking he should probably deal with the problem before he went to sleep, knowing he was too tired to even remember what the problem was.

Olivia.

Olivia was the problem. He needed to talk to her.

But his body wasn't working. And he didn't know where his phone was.

Maybe it was in his pocket. He reached up, his arm so heavy it dropped like dead weight onto his chest.

Why was his shirt soaked?

He forced his hand up to his eyes. The street lamp only let him identify something dark on his skin. His hand dropped onto his face; he was too tired to hold it up any longer.

And there was the smell, sweet and coppery and so painfully familiar. As a cop, it was one of those smells he knew too well.

Blood.

That couldn't be good.

Maybe that was the problem.

Whatever the problem was, he reasoned, it would still be there in the morning.

And so would Olivia. Olivia was always there. She'd make it better. She made everything better.

A surge of adrenaline ran through him, hastening the flow of blood onto his shirt, sharpening his senses long enough for one last coherent thought before the darkness set in.

Olivia.

Fuck, she didn't know he was coming.

Fuck, she wouldn't know why he wasn't there.

Fuck, she would never know that he loved her too.


	4. Chapter 4

Part Four

He was going to kill the bastard who had the audacity to wake him up. It was a little after two in the morning and the fucker obviously had the wrong number. Rather than getting up to point that out, he lay there, figuring his voice mail would take care of it. Finally, the ringing stopped, blanketing the house in blissful silence.

Two seconds after his cell quieted, the land line started up.

Damn it, not a wrong number. Clearly, just someone with a death wish.

Or really bad news.

He grabbed the receiver, his anger at being disturbed fading as the worry set in. "Yeah?"

"Captain Cragen?" There was a pause, not long enough for him to dispute the fact that he was no longer a captain. "This is Melanie from dispatch. We've got word from Mercy that one of your detectives was just brought into the ER with a gunshot wound." The woman's cheerful voice stopped as though she were reading a script that told her to pause, her tone making it seem that she had no comprehension of what she was reporting.

And in that pause, he thought his heart stopped. "Who? When? What happened?"

Fuck that he didn't have any detectives anymore. Fuck that he wasn't a captain any longer. Fuck anyone who thought those detectives from Special Victims weren't like his children.

He was already half dressed by the time Melanie came up with the name Stabler. Of course it was Stabler. The man was always accident-prone when Olivia wasn't at his side.

It was only after Melanie indicated she had no further information that Don corrected the department's mistake. The paperwork was lagging, as usual. He informed her that she had a few more calls to make – the find the new captain of the unit, to find which unit Elliot had moved to, to actually contact Elliot's current captain. Melanie's voice was disappointed at the notion that she had additional work to complete. But Don didn't care. He was simply thankful for the glitch, for once, that allowed him to stay involved.

Don was in his car, barreling down the streets, before he thought about her. Melanie would eventually track down the information she needed and contact Elliot's boss. The new captain would undoubtedly contact Kathy since Elliot's personnel file was probably still sitting on his desk. The new partner would get word in a few hours when he reported to work.

No one would call Olivia.

No one would know to call Olivia.

And Don was the only one who knew Olivia was the first person Elliot would want to see when he woke up. If he woke up. Shit, he still didn't know how badly Elliot was injured. And that was information Olivia would demand when he called her. She'd be pissed off if he didn't call her right away too.

He didn't need to weigh the options. He just dialed her number.

"Huh?"

He'd been expecting the same sharp voice he'd always known. He'd been expecting her to still remember his phone number because it hadn't been three weeks since he was her boss. He actually pulled the phone from his ear to check that he'd dialed the right number.

"Olivia?"

"Hey, cap!" She paused for a moment like she was confused. "Guess I can't call you that anymore."

"Olivia, I don't give a shit what you call me. Are you ok?" He wasn't sure if she was drunk or asleep, but he'd never heard her sound quite so awful in all the years he'd known her.

She answered with a snicker that wasn't the least bit amused. "Oh, yeah, I'm fucking great. How are you?" She snickered again, telling him exactly how drunk she was. "Elliot's great too. Just saw him. Said he was here to celebrate. Probably getting rid of me once and for all."

He wished he'd waited to call her. She was too drunk to understand.

But then her words sunk in. Elliot had been there. She was upset. They'd probably had a fight. Shit. And then Elliot had gone and gotten shot. Stupid fucking rotten timing. Unfuckingbelievable timing.

"Olivia, I need you to sober up. Where are you? Are you at home?"

"I'm in a bar."

He hadn't had such a ridiculous conversation since that god damned fuck up of a night.

* * * * *

When he got his hands on the two of them, he was going to wring their necks. He was the fucking captain. Even if Munch and Fin's repeated radio calls into Elliot's earpiece were ok to be ignored, the fucking boss' was not. What the fuck were they doing in there, ignoring the fact that the op had been called off?

He already had a fifth victim, a damn kid too, the last thing he needed was his fucking detectives blowing him off.

"Hey, cap," Fin hadn't gotten any further.

Don was looking to kill someone and Fin had just volunteered. "What the hell is the matter now?" He did not want to hear that there was some technical problem that got Elliot and Olivia off the hook. Even if it was just Elliot who was ignoring him since Olivia's outfit didn't consist of enough fabric to conceal a wire, he knew full well they were never far enough apart that she wouldn't have been able to hear the shouts coming through Elliot's radio. Definitely not with the way Elliot had been glued to her side since she'd come out of the locker room in that get-up. He'd been pretending to be protecting her from things that went bump in the bullpen, but Don was well aware that one of his detectives was feeling up another. And that she wasn't doing a damn thing to dissuade him.

Not that he could blame Elliot for trying. Don wasn't blind and even twenty years her senior, he might have tried something himself if he wasn't her boss. And if Elliot wouldn't have fucking killed him for it.

Unwilling to bring any more attention to himself than necessary, Fin just nodded toward the screen showing the front door of the club. The screen that revealed the unresponsive Elliot, storming down the sidewalk with a furious expression on his face.

Don snarled. If Elliot thought he was having a bad night already, just wait till he found out his boss was about to rip him a new one.

But before he could get to the door, to meet the detective on the street if only to start yelling sooner, Munch let out a wolf whistle, calling his attention back to the screen. There was Olivia, still wearing a tiny, clingy skirt, spiky heels that put her eye-to-eye with her partner, and something closely resembling a handkerchief around her chest in a total flip-off to the notion of modesty. Her makeup was still heavily over done, just like most of the club goers, but her lipstick had worn off. Her hair was considerably more mussed than if had been when she'd climbed out of the van a few hours earlier.

Munch had been right to whistle.

The woman was the embodiment of wanton sex. She looked like something off the cover of a trashy novel.

And she was chasing after Elliot as fast as those ridiculous shoes would carry her, tripping and tottering, her face confused and distraught, her voice desperate.

"Elliot!"

The sound seemed distorted as it found its way through Elliot's wire. Not distorted enough that he shouldn't have understood it. Not distorted enough that he shouldn't have turned around.

But he didn't. Though he was out of the range of the camera by then, it was clear from her subsequent attempts to get his attention, each slightly more frantic than the last, that he was still walking away from her.

A moment later, the back door of the van was flung open. "Are we fucking done here?" The three men inside were stunned into silence, unprepared for Elliot's pure rage.

Nor were they prepared for the way Olivia appeared immediately behind him, her uncoordinated staggering and slurred speech impossible to blame on her shoes. "El? What happened? What's wrong?"

Apparently completely unconcerned with the audience, he turned back to her, shouting at her in a way Don had never witnessed from his detective. "What the fuck is the matter with you? Have you lost you fucking mind?" He leaned into her, his balance obviously as hard-earned as hers, grabbing her roughly, shaking her while he yelled, only letting go when it became clear that they were both about to fall. And then he shoved her away and practically collapsed half into the van and half onto the street.

Don had never seen Elliot exhibit such violence toward a woman, would never have imagined he'd act that way toward Olivia. And he never would have expected the way Olivia recoiled, her shoulders hunching forward as she wrapped her arms around her bare midsection, tears drawing black streaks of makeup down her cheeks.

"I'm sorry, El."

She sounded so small and weak and unlike herself that it prompted the three observers to look among themselves. Something seemed to click, the odd behavior, the ignored radio calls, the rape victim's drugged eyes, wide as saucers as she'd been loaded into the bus.

Don climbed out of the van, reaching back to grab a flashlight. He went for Olivia first since she tended to be the more compliant of the two. "Look at me." He shone the light at her eyes, watching her wince as her pupils failed to respond to the influx of light.

"Can you stand up?" He watched as she stared at him, seeming far too confused by the question.

"Where's Elliot?" She remained where she was, leaning against the door, letting it do all the work of holding her up. "Let me talk to Elliot." As though she wasn't standing, leaning, right next to him. "I'll be fine if I can just talk to El."

Furious, Don turned to Elliot. "Where the fuck were you while someone was drugging your partner?"

Elliot stood up, rather he tried to, surging forward, losing his balance, and then crumbling onto the ground. "Nobody touched her." He glanced toward her. "She's just gone fucking psycho."

"Jesus, you're no better off than her." He tried to catch Elliot's eyes with the light, but the younger man's anger extended beyond just his partner and he knocked the light out of Don's hand.

"Fuck off, both of you."

Before Elliot had a chance to figure out what was happening, he and his partner were scooped into the van and driven to the hospital.

* * * * *

Don took a deep breath, thanking god that he'd sworn off alcohol years earlier. He knew how shitty she was going to feel in the morning and he didn't envy that she'd be spending her hangover in the waiting room at Mercy, worrying about Elliot, with whom she'd been fighting when last they spoke.

"Which bar?"

"Uh…" There was quiet while she tried to figure it out. "It's the one by the precinct."

"I'll be right there." He shook his head as he hung up on her. There were about a hundred bars "by the precinct" provided the precinct she was talking about was the one-six. He'd heard a rumor that she'd been reassigned and he hoped that he wasn't about to spend the night trying every bar in Manhattan.

There was one place near the one-six that had been somewhat of a hangout, when the squad had been so inclined to hang out. It was somewhere they both felt comfortable. Which would explain how they'd run into each other.

Although it was rather strange for them to still be arguing after so long. More than likely, he determined, they'd gone there together and wound up fighting. And that made even less sense because she should have noticed if her companion for the evening disappeared. Though not necessarily if they were fighting. When Elliot and Olivia were fighting, they wouldn't notice if the world came to an end.

Luckily, the bar wasn't too far out of his way. He expected her to be outside, waiting for him. He expected her to at least be near the door, checking for him, since it was the first time he'd ever called her for a non-work related reason and declared he was picking her up. But as the minutes ticked by and he couldn't even be certain he was in the right place, he realized he was going to have to go in and look for her. He turned on his flashers and left the car double-parked.

The last place he wanted to be was a dark, dismal cop bar. It was hard enough to fight the urge to drink every day. It was even harder since his forced retirement when the anger and frustration longed to be drowned in a bottle of whiskey. Part of him wanted to take a seat in one of the well-worn stools along the bar, down a couple of shots, and find someone to listen to all the stories he had to tell.

Instead, he turned toward the small booths against the back wall and spotted the reason he was there. She was nearly asleep on the table, her head cradled in her arm. He didn't even need to see her face to know she looked like shit. He'd been there enough times to know. He'd never known her to be much of a drinker, ever mindful of her mother's habit, and he'd certainly never seen her passed out face-down in a bar.

"Olivia, let's go." He stood at the side of the booth next to her, unwilling to take the time to sit down across from her. Time was of the essence.

Her head lifted up slowly, her dulled reflexes still identifying his voice as a superior. "Hey, Don!" She motioned at the seat across from her. "Sit down, have a drink with me."

"Time to go." He used his captain voice, the one that usually meant whoever he was talking to was in a great deal of trouble. He hoped it would get through to her.

She lifted her hand, pointing at him for a moment like she was trying to remind herself. "That's right, you don't drink. Oops."

Giving up on communicating with her, at least while one of her hands was still wrapped around a shot glass, he reached for her arm. "On your feet. Now." It felt strange, having his hands on her, discovering that his hand nearly wrapped round her small arm. It was only the second time in fifteen years that he'd touched her and he'd gotten the same reaction from her then.

She yanked her arm out of his grasp. "Don't touch me!"

He didn't want to do it, but he wasn't sure anything else would get through to her. He bent over, one hand resting on the table, the other on the booth, leaning closer to the far side where she'd crouched to get away from him. "Olivia, listen to me. Elliot was shot tonight. He's at Mercy. We need to go now."

Her eyes held his for a long moment, disbelief fighting with inebriation. Then she shook her head. "No, he was here tonight." She waved her hand at nothing in particular. "He was fine." She snarled and reached for the glass Don promptly pushed away. "Bastard. Son of a bitch. I fucking hate him."

"Uh huh, sure you do." He grabbed for her arm again, hoping no one was going to notice that he was trying to drag an unwilling drunk woman out of a bar in the middle of the night. Especially when he had no credentials to flash at them to let them know he had any sort of a right to do so. He shook her hard, hoping the surge of anger would help bring her around. "I don't know what condition he's in, Olivia. Mercy called dispatch, so he's not conscious. Do you get me? Elliot was shot."

Her eyes widened and she swallowed hard. "Elliot?" Her chin started to tremble. "Shot?"

"Yes, let's go." He took her arm again, finding her considerably more agreeable, though entirely uncoordinated, and led her to his car.

She sniffled to herself as he drove and Don found himself growing more and more pissed that Elliot would leave her in such a condition. He slowed down a bit to blow through a red light, catching sight of her terrified face as he checked to make sure it was clear.

"I don't hate him."

"I know that." He pressed his foot a little harder down on the accelerator, knowing nothing was going to get them there fast enough to avoid what was coming.

"I love him."

"I know that." It wasn't as awful hearing it as he'd feared; it hadn't been the least bit surprising. There was very little besides heartbreak that could make someone crawl inside a bottle like she had.

"He doesn't love me."

That was the surprising part. That was the part that hurt. Because although he was sure she was wrong, he knew something had led her to the state she was in. And he knew Elliot had done his damnedest to convince of her that.


	5. Chapter 5

Part Five

Never in her life had she ever felt quite so bad. And she'd felt pretty fucking bad a lot of times. Of course, she'd never tried to wait out a hangover, staying awake, while sitting in a brightly-lit, incredibly loud hospital corridor.

She'd already puked three times and she wasn't convinced she was done for the day. But her body's processing of the altogether frightening amount of alcohol she'd ingested was the last thing on her mind.

While her body remained considerably intoxicated, her mind had sobered right up. Unable to move far or speak without revealing her condition to any of a hundred people she'd rather keep it from, she was trapped, her mind free to recall and dissect recent events. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, she couldn't quite remember the last fight she'd had with Elliot. She only knew that there had been one and that it had ended very badly.

And that it was just before he'd been shot.

As bad as she felt, the hangover was really the least of her problems. She couldn't yet face the notion of why she sitting there in the hospital. But she recognized that she'd gotten there somehow and although she had no recollection of it in particular she suspected that the man who'd been thankfully silent since she'd been sober enough to be aware was the reason. In fact, she vaguely remembered something she still hoped was a figment of her imagination, though she doubted even her warped brain could come up with something as god awful as telling her boss that she was in love with her partner while he was driving her to the hospital to see said partner.

The fact that he was her retired ex-boss and she'd been talking about her ex-partner did nothing to lessen the distress over her stupidity. She wanted to apologize, to claim that she had a tendency to make shit up when she was drunk, to try to convince the man she'd been talking about someone else entirely. But she doubted anything she said would have any effect besides drawing attention to her statement and she preferred not to do that if at all possible. The best thing to do about that was simply pretend it hadn't happened which she knew Cragen would have the sense to do as well. On the up side, she was fairly certain that she'd also declared that she hated Elliot too, not that Cragen was liable to buy that one.

She did, however, still want to beg forgiveness for dragging the poor man into a bar to get her, an incredible favor to ask of an alcoholic, even if the jury was still out as to whether or not she'd asked him for the favor. She couldn't imagine what had possessed her to call him for a ride, except that she didn't have anyone else to call.

Instead of saying a word, a notion that was strangely nauseating, she sat there quietly, willing the building to stop spinning around her quite so violently. The spinning was one of the many reasons she usually shied away from drinking heavily. The spinning sensation, aside from the unpleasant physical side effects, left her feeling particularly vulnerable. And she hated being vulnerable.

Especially when Elliot wasn't there to cling to.

Not that clinging to Elliot had turned out well at all when she had tried it.

* * * * *

The club made her nervous. Her outfit made her nervous. It was a strange feeling, since she'd been fine with the whole concept a few minutes earlier.

She hadn't been fearful of crowds in clubs for years, not by herself, certainly not with Elliot surgically attached to her. And he had been, throughout the precinct, riding in the van, standing in line at the door, when the bouncer's appreciative stare plucked her from the group to allow her entrance, which extended to Elliot simply because their hands appeared to be fused together.

And the clothing, borrowed from a friend in vice because she didn't own anything nearly ridiculous enough for the occasion, hadn't bothered her at all. On the rare undercover op that she got to dress in revealing clothes, she usually enjoyed it. It was fun. It was like playing dress up. And the inordinate amount of attention her partner paid to her when she was scantily clad never failed to thrill her in a way she would never dare mention. She liked the attention from other men as well, like when the bouncer had picked her out from among much younger women dressed the same way. She enjoyed knowing that she still had it, that she could turn heads, that her demanding workouts paid off. As long as Elliot was beside her, and he always was when she got to dress like that, she didn't have to worry about practical concerns like her safety. Her outfit earned her the added protection of Elliot's raging hormones.

Plus there was the bonus of having Elliot's undivided attention on her body. She always gave him credit for treating her like an equal; it was a nice change of pace for him to notice she was a woman. She liked having him wrapped around her finger for a few hours. It was empowering.

But that had changed within minutes of passing through the doors. She felt anxious and exposed, as though all the men checking her out could see right through her skimpy clothes. She knew Elliot felt it too, based on the ever-tightening grip he had on her hand and the ferocious way he shoved the one bastard who was bold enough to ask to buy her a drink.

She tried to analyze the feeling to determine its source, to see if it was due to being in the place where four women with nothing in common had reported being raped, or maybe because that information coupled with her attire made her fear that one of the men looking at her had rape on their minds.

Or even, as Elliot gave up on holding her hand and instead wrapped his arm around her and pulled her into his side, if perhaps she was simply mirroring her partner's nerves over being responsible for her, unarmed, un-wired and easily a target for the sort of bottom-feeder who drugged and raped women in clubs.

Elliot shelled out cash for their drinks from the roll of twenties he'd been loaned for the occasion. It had been important, they decided, that they look the part. And that Olivia look interesting enough to catch the eye of whoever was behind the attacks, which they'd determined had to be connected to the club in some way. It was too unlikely that the three different men who'd been described as the attackers, only one of whom had committed two rapes, were all coincidentally targeting the same club the same month. So Olivia was dressed to get attention and Elliot was supposed to keep an eye on her.

She wanted to point out, in her finest detached professional voice, that no one was going to even try with Elliot playing alpha male and remaining quite possessive of her. But something in her brain told her to shut up and enjoy the feeling of his hand low on her hip, of his sleeve brushing against the skin of her back, obstructed only by the crisscrossed laces that held her top in place.

She knew she was supposed to be paying attention to the scene, looking around for anything suspicious, checking each man against the memorized descriptions of the rapists. Even as she tried to keep focused on it, her brain was steadily refusing to cooperate; each attempt to continue working becoming less effective than the last.

By the time Elliot had steered them over to a corner from which to observe, Olivia could barely keep her eyes open. He busied himself with concealing the fact that he was dumping their drinks into a nearby plant while she worked to keep herself on her feet.

The heat coming from so many bodies packed in such a small space was falling over her, bathing her body in warmth. The music was coming in waves, floating into her ears. And Elliot, he was behind her, giving her something solid and warm and intoxicating to lean against. She forgot everything but how she was feeling. Good. Great. Fantastic. Elliot was holding her against him, his arms looped protectively, possessively, around her waist, his face tucked next to hers.

Maybe he was watching still, but her eyes were closed, soaking up the comfort and lightness and wonder of just rolling.

She turned her head, pressing her face a bit harder against his, loving the feel, the smell of him, the way he felt so close to her, the constant pressure of his body, warm and solid behind her. His arms remained locked around her, helping her considerably with the work of standing since without him, she might have melted right into the floor. Everything felt so good, she felt so good, that it took her a while to notice, but once she realized it, she couldn't concentrate on anything else.

Ever so lightly, Elliot's thumb was stroking back and forth, the pad brushing her bare belly.

She couldn't help it. She groaned from the sensation, completely convinced she might come right there, just like that, from the incredible feeling of his skin on hers.

He shushed her, his face turning into her ear, his lips brushing the lobe as he whispered, "The wire, Liv."

She was trapped in a gentle, rolling fog and had no idea what he was talking about. But he wanted her to be quiet, and so, she would be quiet. Anything for the man who was making her feel such wonder.

He moved his head, shifting slightly, his lips teasing along her neck for only a second.

It took all of her power not to moan again. Instead she reached for him, her hands landing on his forearms, her nails digging into his skin.

Hours, days, years, eons might have gone by. She couldn't tell. The world was a happy, colorful, amazing fucking fog. And she'd never felt so fucking spectacular ever in her life. She could hear a voice, vaguely familiar, coming through the earpiece Elliot was wearing, but the words made no sense to her. She didn't even know if there were words at all. Maybe it was just a voice, just a sound, rolling around in the fog with all the others. She felt like she might be fog herself, with only Elliot's hold keeping her from floating off.

Elliot.

She turned toward him, no longer able to stand not being able to see him. She could feel him, supporting her, keeping her solid, his hands keeping her nerve endings on fire. Spinning around was far more difficult than she remembered; actually, the spinning was easy, the stopping and remaining upright was the complicated part. Except Elliot was there to help her. Elliot was always there.

And for once, he was there touching her, exactly like she wanted him too.

She could hear the voice again, maybe more than one. But Elliot didn't seem to notice them at all. He was staring at her, his eyes dark, pupils wide, trying to make up for the low lighting. But his stare was electric, powerful, magnetic. She leaned into him, pressing her hands against his chest. She loved the feel of his body, the soft cotton of his shirt, the hard plane of muscle underneath, the heat radiating through the fabric into her hands.

His whole body felt amazing, everywhere it touched hers.

Which was everywhere.

And still, she wanted more. She rocked her hips, shifting her hands down as her arms slipped around his waist. His hold tightened in response, his hands pulling her harder against him, his arousal immediately starting to press back against her.

And still, she held his eyes. She couldn't even focus on him, his face seeming to swim in and out of the fog around her. But she could feel him, could feel him feeling her.

God, she felt so fucking good.

And he liked the way she felt. She could tell from the way he was looking at her, from the way he was touching her, from the way he was pressing his hips into hers.

So fucking good.

No one had ever felt so fucking unbelievable ever in history. And Elliot was helping her feel so good.

She wanted to share it with him.

She leaned forward, her arms pulling back, her hands resting on his belt, her forehead resting on his chest as she looked down, her eyes somewhat helping her uncoordinated fingers as they worked his button and zipper.

His fingers tightened sharply as her intent became clear. She looked back up at him, knowing there was nothing but love and happiness reflecting on her face. There couldn't be anything else; she'd never felt anything else.

His eyes were questioning, darting down to the lighter which concealed the wire in his shirt pocket. But she didn't know what he meant to tell her or ask her.

She could only feel. And she felt him.

And he wanted her.

* * * * *

No, she definitely wasn't done being sick.

She stood on shaking legs and headed for the bathroom, her hand on the wall, helping to hold her up and to guide her.

There was no more rum sitting in her stomach, but that didn't keep her stomach from trying to expel it anyway. After several long minutes, she cupped her hands under the sink faucet and gulped down a couple handfuls of water. She didn't know if it would help settle her stomach or at least give her something to vomit, but she figured it couldn't hurt by then.

She wanted to collapse, to curl up on the cold tile floor, close her eyes, and sleep for a long, long time.

But how could she sleep?

She was in a hospital, for god's sake, awaiting news on whether or not her best friend, her only friend, was still alive.

She couldn't choke back the sob nor could she keep the tears at bay. Drunk or not, she suddenly felt the full force of the words Cragen had hit her with. Elliot was shot. He'd been found less than a mile from the bar, but it had been almost two in the morning. He'd been so close, lying there for hours, bleeding, probably in pain, possibly dying, after having left her side while she'd been sitting in that booth wanting to forget him.

She collapsed against the wall, sliding down until she hit the floor, her arms hugging her belly as she sobbed.

She never wanted to forget him.

She never wanted to leave him.

She never wanted anything but him.

If only she'd been decent to him, if only she hadn't sent him running, if only she hadn't said something she knew would send him running, he might have been sitting in that booth with her, both of them drinking until they forgot their problems. He could have been close and safe and perfect right in front of her.

She berated herself, wondering why she always had to say the wrong thing to him, wondering why she couldn't just take what he was willing to give her. He wanted to be friends. She knew she should have simply accepted that and been the best damn friend he could have asked for.

Instead she pushed and pushed and pushed until she pushed him in front of a gun.

She knew, if he lived, that he'd never forgive her. She'd blown her chance to keep his friendship, to keep him in her life.

Every minute that went by, she was one minute further away from a life she recognized. Every minute that went by, she felt a little bit worse, about her behavior, her actions, her decisions. Every minute that went by, she was one minute closer to losing him.

And all she could do was watch it all fall apart.


	6. Chapter 6

Part Six

He was choking. There was something in his throat, blocking his air, torturing him while it slowly sucked away all his air. He fought as hard as he could, trying to find some part of his body that was willing to cooperate. Nothing was working.

Except his brain.

And his brain said that he wasn't just choking. Someone was choking him. Someone was killing him and he couldn't do anything but wait for them to succeed.

He heard a voice, the person trying to kill him, and he wondered what the point was of talking to the person you were murdering. Rather than understanding the words, he tried to hone in on the voice, tried to figure out who it was. He wanted to be able to identify whoever had tried to kill him in case he survived. The voice was female, soft and soothing under any other circumstances. But he wasn't really surprised. There were a couple women he knew who probably wanted to strangle him on any given day.

He continued to fight, his mouth and throat the only parts that were bothering to respond to his mind. There was nothing they could do, though. And so, he waited to die.

As he waited, the words, the meaningless, pointless words of his attacker, swam into focus.

"Cough, Elliot, just cough. It'll help me remove the tube."

Try as he might, he couldn't place it. He couldn't figure out who was talking to him. He wondered if he'd find out after he died, if his spirit would get up, survey the scene, then walk away from everything the way it always happened in the movies.

"Come on, Elliot, help me out here."

He didn't answer, didn't try to help. The coughing was a reflex, his throat continuing to fight after his brain had given up on it. But he was trying to cough and inhale at the same time and it just made him cough harder, unable to catch his breath for a few terrifying moments. Wild beeping accompanied his racing heart as he wondered if that was really going to be it for him.

"There you go, you're ok. Just takes a minute." The voice was joined by a hand, patting his shoulder lightly. "All better now."

As his coughing started to die off, he found he could breathe once again, that the pressure in his throat was gone. He sucked in a deep breath instinctively, unprepared for such intense soreness of his mouth and throat that even breathing hurt.

Finally, in confusion, in pain, in fear, he pulled at his eyes, not sure if he should be happy or not that they responded immediately to his command. It was terribly bright and he turned his head, finding refuge from the light in the shape beside him. Slowly his brain absorbed the information, fitting pieces together as best he could.

The shape, the hand, the voice all appeared to belong to an older woman dressed in light blue scrubs. She was collecting a bunch of things, pieces of plastic, tape, tissues, even some tubing, wadding the pile together and tossing it in the trash. Turning back to him, she smiled, her lined face and gray hair reminding him of his grandmother.

"You've been fighting with that respirator all night, so the doctor decided it was time to let you have your way." Her badge, complete with a photograph at least twenty years old, identified her as Elaine R., Respiratory Therapist, Mercy Hospital.

What the fuck was he doing in a hospital?

He opened his mouth to voice the thought, remembering the soreness of his mouth and throat the moment he attempted to speak.

"Give yourself a rest, hon. Your vocal chords are probably a bit upset about the tubes. Don't try to talk for a little while." She patted him on the shoulder again. "The nurses will be in shortly to make sure you're doing ok. If you need anything, just press the call button." She wiggled the cord resting next to his hand. "They'll come running if you call. And I'm sure your wife will help you with anything else." And then she pressed a couple of buttons on the machine beside him and was gone in a flash, having told him nothing he needed to know.

His eyes fell on the beige plastic tube that held the red button. He could press it, bring on the nurses, and get nowhere. He couldn't speak. Therefore, they would assess him and then leave him in the same situation. No use bugging them. He wasn't sure he wanted to know anyway.

In lieu of having any other way of finding out, he started on a mental inventory of his body. His head was working, turning both ways, and although he couldn't talk, everything attached to his head seemed to be working too. Lifting his head, he gazed down at his body, hoping to find something immediately obvious like a cast. But all he saw was an outline of his form tucked under a heavy white blanket. A thin green stripe ran down the blanket by his left side, faded and stained in a few spots. He wondered why they always chose white for something that was doomed to be stained.

He moved on to his hands, testing one then the other. His arms were next, left, then right, and although they seemed quite a bit heavier than he remembered, they were ok too. More of the same with his feet and legs. Slow, heavy, tired, but working. Which left him with the obvious answer – whatever was wrong was in his torso.

He lifted his heavy arms, grabbed at the edges of the blanket, and lifted. Either the blanket was really fucking heavy or his arms weren't as ok as he thought.

His head was really heavy too, and he couldn't stop it from flopping back down on the crunchy plastic pillow, too winded to even think about trying a second time. His eyes drifted closed, exhausted from the pathetic workout he'd had. He was too tired to even be embarrassed about his weakness.

* * * * *

He didn't know how it was possible to have such incredibly bad luck, but he must have broken a mirror or walked under a ladder or something. Someone somewhere was hexing him or was sticking pins in a voodoo doll. Something was just wrong with how his life was going.

It was the first time in years that he'd been sitting in his driveway, done work for the day, while the sun had not yet set. And he hadn't even been there the entire night before.

Unfortunately, he'd been sitting in the car in the driveway for nearly an hour and hadn't managed to drag his ass into the house yet. No one had noticed his presence; no one would think to look for him while they sat down to dinner. Elliot saw his kids on his way out the door in the morning and sometimes when the midnight munchies coincided with one of them sneaking in from a party and every once in a while when they happened to watch TV on a weekend after he'd passed out on the couch in the wee hours.

They'd know. All of them. Everyone who happened to be home would know something was horribly wrong the moment he stepped through the door, even if he left his box of shit cleared off his desk in the car. And he just didn't feel like explaining it.

Because they'd probably be happy with the news.

Because he wanted to eat his gun over the news.

But after the nosy neighbor peeked out her window for the fourth time, he knew he had no choice, short of having to explain himself to Queens PD while Kathy came outside to investigate the commotion. And she was still pissed off over the squad car that had carted Kathleen to jail. No use making her angry too.

Finally he made his way to the front door, holding his breath as he fit his key in the lock. It was always a surprise that she hadn't changed the locks and thrown him out again. No one in the family was fooled into thinking the marriage was happy. The fact that it continued to exist on any level was constantly amazing.

Complete and utter silence greeted him when he stepped inside.

The kind of complete and utter silence that only occurs when normal talking stops abruptly.

He turned toward the dining room, not even bothering to smile, not even sure he could speak. There was his family. His wife. His kids – the ones that still lived at home. One tiny body in a high chair. Two gangly teens that hadn't yet adjusted to grown up parts.

"Dad?" Lizzie was the first to speak, having inherited her mother's ability to talk about anything and everything at any given moment. "What are you doing here?"

He tried to make a joke of it, looking at her with a grimace instead of a smile. "I still live here, don't I?" The problem with such a joke was that he was half serious.

Kathy put down the spoon she was using to feed Eli and stood up. "I wasn't expecting you home. Are you going back out?" She stood up, moving toward the kitchen. "Let me get you a plate."

He practically staggered toward the table, feeling disconnected from both his body and his family. There was a fourth chair, but it hadn't been used in so long that it had a stack of magazines and catalogs on it, pushed back against the wall, clearly indicating that his family expected him as much as he expected to be there. He didn't bother with the chair. He nodded at his kids, unable to give them anything more, and passed behind Kathy while she scooped green beans onto the plate for him.

"Don't bother. I'm not hungry." He pulled open the fridge, grabbed a beer, and then contemplated whether or not to grab a second before he sat down. It wasn't worth it, he decided, simply because taking two beers would likely result in a lecture about setting a bad example for the two teens who hadn't yet been caught drinking underage.

Kathy turned around, the half-filled plate in one hand, a pot lid in the other. "Are you ok? Is something wrong?"

He looked at her, glanced over her shoulder at the kids who weren't paying the least bit of attention to him, and then shrugged. "We can talk about it later."

Later came after dinner, after an argument between Kathy and Dickie regarding homework, after the dishes were washed, and after Eli was changed and settled on the living room floor to play. Kathy took a seat on the couch next to Elliot, waiting expectantly.

But Elliot, who'd been staring blankly for over an hour after his beer was finished, didn't know what to say. He felt like he was a kid again, having to confess something stupid to his mother so he could just hurry up and get in trouble. Except that he'd already been punished, would continue to be punished forever, and telling Kathy that he'd probably never see Olivia again wouldn't strike her as a punishment.

"Elliot, what's going on?" She spoke softly, her hand brushing his arm.

Sighing, he knew he had to tell her, just to get it out of the way, just so he could go back to sulking. "We had a case and it was a mess. The investigation went to hell and the undercover shit got all fucked up-"

"Damn it, Elliot, watch your mouth! He's starting to repeat things!" Kathy nodded at Eli, who was playing away happily despite the foul language of both his parents.

"Cragen was forced to resign over it."

Kathy drew in a sharp breath, as though that piece of information actually mattered to her. "What about you? Did you get blamed? Did you get in trouble?"

He noticed that she didn't ask him if he'd done anything wrong. He imagined she already knew the answer to that. "I got reassigned today."

"Reassigned?" Her voice was hesitant, not wanting to pass judgment either way until he confirmed what he thought of it.

He took a moment, feeling his eyes starting to water, knowing better than to cry over losing Olivia in front of his wife. "Demoted, basically. I'm in robberies as of tomorrow morning."

Her face fell as she realized it was bad news for her too. "Demoted? You mean you'll make less?"

He shook his head. "No, technically I'll make the same amount, but-" He sighed, wishing his wife understood him and how he felt, knowing that if she did, she certainly wouldn't be his wife any longer. "I'll be working more regular hours, easier cases, a lot less overtime, so I'll be bringing in a lot less."

The truth was, as much as she bitched about it, the family had profited from all those hours Elliot spent not there. They wouldn't even recognize his new paychecks. He wasn't sure they'd even be able to keep both cars when it came down to it.

"Do you know how much less? We'll have to sit down and look at the bills. See what we can cut out. Maybe we can borrow some money from my parents for a while." She squeezed his arm, a smile coming to her face. "We made it with less when we started out. We'll be ok."

He nodded, not feeling a bit reassured. A million dollars wouldn't make him feel better. "Yeah, I guess."

She cocked her head to the side. "Do you think it's temporary? Maybe if you do well for a while they'll put you back in Special Victims?"

Elliot met her eyes, knowing exactly what Kathy was really asking. "Olivia got booted to another precinct entirely."

For a moment, the concern slipped as her lips quirked part of the way toward a smile, but she hid it quickly. If Elliot hadn't been a detective, he never would have noticed. "So she got in more trouble than you?"

Angry over the slight, he narrowed his eyes. "No. She's working homicides, so it's a sideways bump for her. Every bit as much OT over there." He sank back against the couch. "But at least she doesn't have to face all the same people everyday."

Although it would be mortifying in its own right, facing people he knew wasn't the reason he was upset.

It was the not facing people he knew that bothered him.

Not facing Olivia in particular.

The job was the only thing they'd had in common. Without it, he'd never have a legitimate reason to talk to her. It was easily the most upsetting piece of news he'd had in years, if not his entire life.

"It was my fault anyway. I was the one who fucked everything up. She shouldn't have been punished for my fuck up."

"You're good at your job, El. You'll clear things up. Besides, you'll get to spend more time with Eli in the mean time."

He nodded, pretending to agree yet again. "Hopefully."

There wasn't a fucking bit of hope left in him, but he didn't know what else to say. He wouldn't mind spending time with his youngest son. He just didn't want to have to give up so much of himself to have it.

She patted his leg dismissively to indicate she was done with the conversation, scooped Eli up from the floor much to the boy's dismay, and started toward the stairs. "I'm going to give the big guy his bath. You want to help?" Her worry about the money paled in comparison to the good news – that her biggest competition for Elliot's attention was out of the picture.

He wanted to sit there and wallow without facing his wife's gloating. But doing so would force the issue of what he was really upset about and he didn't have the strength left in him to fight with Kathy about the woman with whom he'd spent more of the previous fifteen years. He couldn't fight; he wouldn't have any defense. Any questions Kathy raised about his feelings and his partner and, since that fucking night, any physical relationship between them would result in more fucking trouble. More changes. More loss of the things he knew and clung to for any sense of stability.

He needed to hold onto what he had. He already felt like he was in freefall.

Losing Olivia was like losing the ground underneath his feet. He had to grab onto whatever he could reach.

Otherwise there was no telling how far he'd fall.

* * * * *

Just as he was about to fall asleep, Elaine's words drifted through his head. She'd said something about his wife. He forced his eyes open, wondering why Kathy hadn't said anything when he'd tried to examine himself. She could have just told him what was wrong and spared him the trouble of trying to figure it out. His eyes popped open and he looked around. The side of the room where Elaine had stood held medical equipment, a second bed, thankfully empty, a closet, and the door leading out to the rest of the hospital.

It took every last bit of strength he had to force his head in the other direction, letting it fall heavily as he looked for his wife, wondering when the hell the woman had become so silent.

But instead of blonde, it was brunette.

And rather than perched worried at the side of his bed, the form was curled up tightly in a chair against the wall. Her feet were resting on the edge of the seat, her knees pulled in, her forehead collapsed onto them. Her arms were tucked in between her legs and stomach.

Everything about her seemed tight and shrunken. Except her hair, the hair she'd been wearing slightly longer recently, falling loose, hanging over her knees, obscuring her face from view.

But he knew it was her anyway. Though he'd never seen her curled up like that. Though he'd rarely seen her in jeans and sneakers. Though he honestly wasn't expecting that he'd ever see her again.

There she was, tired enough that she was sound asleep in his hospital room, waiting for him to wake up or get better or apologize for being an ass or something.

It didn't matter why she was there, just that she was.

His eyes slipped closed and he drifted to sleep with a smile on his face.


	7. Chapter 7

Part Seven

Altogether in his life, Don was fairly certain the amount of time he'd spent in hospitals would add up to at least several years if not whole decades. Luckily, he'd rarely been the patient. Or perhaps it wasn't lucky. At least being the patient would have spared him the worry and fear of waiting. Of examining the tile floors, somehow always the exact same no matter what hospital he was at. Of inhaling that god-awful stench of heavy chemical sprays mixed with body fluids. Of watching the flickering fluorescent bulb – and there always was one – come on and off at random intervals yet never actually burn out entirely. Of the incessant parade of what-ifs dancing through his mind.

Hell, he didn't even know what he was still doing there. Maybe he was waiting for Elliot to wake up. Maybe he was waiting to offer Olivia a ride. Maybe he was just too tired to go home. Maybe he didn't have anything else to do.

He hadn't moved in a long time, not since Olivia had disappeared into Elliot's finally vacant room. Before then, she'd been waiting with him, except for the intermittent periods she disappeared into the restroom, returning with bloodshot eyes and a runny nose. Being sick, crying – no matter what she'd been doing, it freaked him out. She wasn't supposed to be so weak. She was the strong one, the one who always, well, almost always, had control of herself. She was supposed to be the one telling off the doctors and nurses and surgeons that Elliot was going to be fine and they were all fucking morons if they were worried.

But no, she'd sat quietly, not bothering to ask for or offer reassurance. Not bothering to draw any sort of attention to herself whatsoever. Not when Captain O'Bryan had appeared, finally notified of his new detective's brush with death about an hour after Don had been. Not when Kathy Stabler had appeared, typically loud and hysterical and pretty much making a nuisance of herself by demanding that someone tell her how her husband had been injured when she'd thought he'd moved to a safer job.

Don had ignored her, hoping she wouldn't notice him. He wasn't a captain anymore; dealing with hysterical wives was someone else's problem.

Olivia had done the same.

Kathy had focused on O'Bryan, the poor schmuck who'd shown up in uniform, and didn't have a damn piece of information for her.

When Kathy had finally spotted the two silent individuals who might know something, Don was extremely jealous of Olivia's quick thinking. She'd practically sprung from her seat and declared she needed to find the ladies' room, the first time she'd spoken since they'd arrived. She hadn't come back for almost an hour.

Smart woman had spared herself almost an hour of Kathy's high-pitched hysterics that miraculously evaporated when the doctor announced that Elliot would likely survive. Kathy, who'd spent so much energy worrying about her injured husband, was the first to run into the room as soon as the doctor allowed visitors. But she barely spent five minutes there before she came out, announced that he was asleep, and went home.

Don expected that Olivia would be the next, knowing she was every bit as worried as Kathy had proclaimed to be, knowing that there were plenty of reasons she needed to see the man in one piece before she would be as calm as she was pretending to be. But she didn't. She waited. She waited for O'Bryan to stop in for a few minutes. She waited for a few rounds of doctors and nurses to check on his condition. She waited while Maureen, who'd completely grown up since the last time Don had seen her, stopped in for a visit. She waited while Don himself finally decided to look in on him.

The sight of the detective he'd always thought was so strong and full of life lying there, helpless, having a machine breathe for him, scared the bejesus out of him. When the doctors had said Elliot would probably be ok, he'd taken it and run with it. He hadn't listened closely to the rest, the part he thought didn't really matter, where they mentioned the respirator, where they mentioned that surgery had been touch and go, where they mentioned that his heart had stopped once on the table.

He wasn't in there long.

He could only hope that he didn't look as pale and scared and shaken as he was. That was the last thing Olivia needed

Whether he did or didn't give away his emotions, Olivia didn't even notice. She stood up as soon as he sat down, the legs that had been shaking and barely solid enough to support her all night moving with purpose toward Elliot's room. He admired her for the façade of strength, knowing she was doing it for Elliot, even though he was out cold. She wanted to look like she was ok for him. She'd made it obvious that she didn't give a shit what other people thought about her; it was Elliot's perception that mattered to her.

While he waited for Olivia to reappear, Don allowed his eyes to slip closed. In all the upset, he'd forgotten how tired he was. The nursing shift had changed already; it was morning. He could kill someone for a cup of coffee, but he was too tired to go get one. Olivia had to be as exhausted as him, having outlasted a drunken stupor sitting next to him, so he expected her visit would be kept short, in the interest of propriety. He could make it that long.

"I don't know how you did it as long as you did, Don."

His eyes blinked open as he glanced at the man sitting beside him. He didn't know if Andrew Stephens was that quiet or if he'd simply fallen asleep for a few minutes. "What are you doing here?" He'd known Andrew for a long time. They'd been friends the last time they'd spoken. But he couldn't help being resentful of the man who'd taken his job and dismantled his team.

"Figured I should come check on Stabler."

Don let out a sigh. "Right, after you knew him for what, eight hours?"

Andrew cracked a smile, sitting back in the chair Olivia had occupied all night. "It was more like five hours. He ducked out early that day, but I can't really blame him."

Of course Elliot had left early the day he was more or less fired. Don wouldn't have sat around doing paperwork after the fact either. In fact, he hadn't. He'd left a shitload of paperwork sitting on Andrew's desk.

"Sorry about all the paperwork, Andy."

Andrew nodded. "Yeah, that's the least of my problems."

"So what are you really doing here?" Part of him was really nervous, unsure what he'd do if another member of his former team had been injured as well. A guy could only take so much in one night.

"I figured I'd find you here." Andrew glanced at him for a moment, then watched a group of nurses walk down the hall. "Special Victims is a fucking nightmare. How the hell did you take it for so long?"

Special Victims was a nightmare. But it had been home. It had been a family. Don looked his old friend straight in the eye. "Catching just one prick makes it all worth it."

Andrew just shook his head, his shoulders sinking. "I've got rape victims changing their minds and abused kids refusing to talk and detectives calling out sick every other day and the brass breathing down my neck because I was supposed to make things better and they're all fucked worse than they were."

Don smiled, feeling vindicated for a moment. "It's never going to work without people who care and a team that functions together."

Andrew winced, refusing to look up. "I didn't have a choice. Tossing them was a direct order."

"Now you know why I ignored that same order for years, Andy."

He nodded. "I already tried to get Benson back. She won't answer my calls and the three-two is refusing to give her up. She's too valuable apparently."

"Yeah, she is."

"So what the hell am I supposed to do, Don? Retire?"

He motioned around the hallway. "Retiring didn't help me any." After a long pause, he figured he should offer something besides an 'I told you so.' "Bring Stabler back, after he's discharged. He'll answer your calls and he's wasted in O'Bryan's department anyway."

Andrew looked over at him. "He's going to be ok, right?"

Don nodded. "That's what they're saying."

"What about Benson? I've heard she's the one that gets vics to talk. I really need complaining victims at the moment who are willing to testify."

Don thought about Olivia and how upset she'd been and how long she'd been in with Elliot. "She'll come back if Stabler's back, but I don't think I need to warn you you'll be opening up a big ass can of worms there."

"Sleeping together?"

Don snorted. "No, but I think that's the problem."

Andrew just stared at him for a long time. "Thanks for the help." He nodded as he headed down the hall, hopefully determined to set something right.

It seemed like a big fucking circle to him. There he was, sitting in a hospital corridor, waiting for things to start going right, right where he'd been when they'd started going wrong.

* * * * *

Hospitals were going to be the death of him.

Especially when they were really fucking backed up.

Of all the fucking nights for Elliot and Olivia to both wind up incapacitated and unable to speak for each other, leaving Don holding the bag, it had to be the night when two fucking busses full of tourists collided. One had overturned, leaving every hospital in the city scrambling to deal with over a hundred emergency patients.

Plus two detectives involuntarily drugged and in the midst of colossal temper tantrums.

The overload of patients, as well as the lack of life-threatening injuries to the pair, left them relegated to the hallway. They were both sitting on the same gurney, a few inches separating their bodies, while they both stared pointedly in opposite directions. Don felt like he was punishing two misbehaving children. But he'd demanded they sit down because Elliot kept trying to walk away from Olivia and Olivia kept trying to follow him and every time Don had to chase them down the hallway, they lost their place in line to be seen.

It had been nearly three hours and Don was crossing his fingers that someone would say something to him soon. While he knew the evidence of the drug, whatever it had been, would remain in their systems long enough to likely screw up their next random drug-tests, he really wanted to be far away from them when whatever it was completely wore off. Not that they'd been happy, malleable, well-behaved junkies. But he feared that whatever they'd been given was still having some positive effect on them. He suspected that in a few hours, they'd be screaming at each other, because they always resorted to screaming at each other when they were having a fucking meltdown, and apparently, something had happened in that club to cause them to have a fucking meltdown.

And whatever it had been, odd enough that it had been completely silent since there hadn't been one fucking sound through Elliot's wire to indicate there was any sort of trouble, Don absolutely did not want to find out what it had been when they started screaming at each other over it in public. If they were going to make a scene, he wanted to be far enough away that he could pretend he didn't know them.

Which he couldn't do while he was standing in front of them to make sure they stayed put.

The doctor eventually took a look at them, listened to the story and shook his head sadly. He'd seen a lot of the same, he said, club-goers, though usually not cops, feeling sick, confused, not acting right. At first, the rash of incidents had been attributed to alcohol, but Elliot and Olivia hadn't ingested a drop, Cragen insisted.

The doctor nodded and picked Elliot's hand off the bed where it rested. Elliot snarled and snatched his hand back. The doctor moved on to Olivia to demonstrate. The red-inked outline of a monkey, so appropriate, he remarked, stamped on her hand to indicate she was legal to drink. He was going to screen them to be sure, but it was most likely ecstasy. That was what they'd found on all the others that had been tested.

They were compromised the moment they'd walked through the doors.

Honestly, the last thing he would have ever expected to happen with Elliot and Olivia high on ecstasy together was a fight. It made him wonder what caused the fight. And he was pretty damn sure a fight had actually been the last thing to happen to them while they were high together – and that the first thing that had happened had been exactly what he'd expected. While they were wired, for fuck's sake. It explained why Elliot was trying to run away. It explained why Olivia was trying to chase him.

Oh _fuck_.

Don shook his head, recognizing the royal fuck-up while his detectives still weren't quite sure what was going on. There was a memo on his desk, somewhere buried in all the piles of shit, that mentioned the hospitals' findings. It had been happening all over the city, dozens of reports. If only he'd paid attention, he might have connected it with the rapes. If only he'd paid attention, he might have spared everyone a whole lot of shit.

A girl had been raped while his detectives were screwing around drugged and he'd been sitting there, watching the whole thing happen because he hadn't been paying attention. Fuck. He'd stepped in it. He'd fucking stepped in it bad.

Heads were going to roll. And he suspected his own would be the first.

He could only hope that Elliot and Olivia, who would undoubtedly get busted for some part in it, wouldn't blame him.

Trying to avoid them for as long as possible, Don called Fin, issuing the order to pick up the entire staff and management of the club. There probably wouldn't be a rape arrest, but narcotics might appreciate the help.

* * * * *

With a sigh, Don went to look at his watch, only to remember he hadn't put it on. Still, Olivia had been in there for a long time and perhaps had no idea he was still waiting for her. He stood up, peeking in the door of Elliot's room.

Thankfully, the ventilator was gone. Elliot was breathing on his own, and in Don's eyes, therefore looked much healthier. In fact, he appeared to be smiling in his sleep. Shaking his head, Don turned his head, catching sight of Olivia.

There she was, curled up in a chair, pushed a respectable distance from the bed of course, sound asleep. No wonder Elliot was smiling. It seemed their fight was finally over.

With his own smile, Don turned to leave, his shoes squeaking loudly on the polished floor.

He heard her jump, her precarious balance lost as her feet slipped off the edge of the chair. "What?"

He winced as he turned back, wishing he hadn't woken her, knowing she needed whatever rest she could find. "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. I was just heading out."

Stretching her neck to the side, Olivia looked at her watch and rubbed her eyes. "I need to get to work anyway."

"Are you sure you're in any shape to work?" Although a few minutes of sleep had done wonders for the way she looked, he knew she felt a hell of a lot worse.

She shrugged. "My vics are all dead. What do they care?"

"You need a ride?"

"Yeah, thanks." She stood up, looking hesitant, biting her lip as she glanced at Elliot's sleeping form. "They pulled the ventilator."

"That's a good sign. Did he wake up at all?" He was just trying to make conversation. It seemed like the thing to do rather than let her fall apart at the notion of actually leaving.

"I don't think so." Her head leaned to the side as she looked at him. "Maybe he did. I think he was looking the other way when I came in."

He couldn't help the smile that spread across his face. "I imagine he liked the view better."

He watched as she processed his words, his meaning, his acknowledgement of the fact that Elliot had turned to look at her at some point. A red blush spread across her cheeks, amazing to see since she'd declared her love for the man a few hours earlier.

Pointedly ignoring him, she slipped past him and out the door, pausing for one last look back at Elliot. "Come to think of it, I'll take the train."

He started walking beside her, needing to break the uncomfortable silence. "You should call Stephens back, Olivia. I think you'll like what he's got to say."

She looked at him, confused for a moment due to the hangover and abrupt change of subject. "I'm not so sure about that."

"Give him a chance." He grinned, watching her eyes turn curious. "He's going to be calling Elliot as soon he's up and around."

"Really?"

He nodded. "Really. I just talked to him."

A smile finally spread across her face as well.


	8. Chapter 8

Part Eight

"Nice of you to join us, princess."

She suspected her glare lost some of its intimidation factor due to her sunglasses, but she wasn't about to take them off. Anxiety, humiliation, utter fear that Elliot might wake up before she left – everything had worked together to prompt her to move, to talk with Cragen, to hop on the damn train that carried her to the precinct that was not her home and would never be her home and where, apparently, people had nothing better to do than watch what time their coworkers arrived. But the damn hangover from hell had returned and strictly forbade her removing her sunglasses.

She flopped into her chair, all of her energy spent already. It was only seven minutes after eight.

Which meant she had a long fucking day ahead of her.

Not that every day wasn't a long fucking day.

Booting up her computer distracted her, as did sifting through the hundred pointless emails in her box. She replied to a couple she deemed important enough to bother with and wondered if anyone would notice if she disappeared into the locker room for a nap. Judging from the way the jackass across the desk was staring at her, she suspected he would. And he'd probably turn her in for it too.

Finally, she turned to face him, removing her sunglasses, wincing at the bright lights. "What?"

He smiled at her. "You're in a great mood today, huh, princess?"

She narrowed her eyes. "You call me princess one more time and you'll be singing soprano, are we clear?"

He nodded, waving a Styrofoam cup at her. "I got you some coffee, but I think it's probably cold by now."

She accepted the lukewarm cup, a twinge of guilt hitting her. It wasn't Matthew's fault he wasn't Elliot. And there was nothing either one of them could do about that anyway. "Sorry. My partner got shot last night. I just left the hospital half an hour ago."

Matthew looked down, patting his chest. "I'm feeling much better now."

Ex-partner. Why was that so hard to remember?

"My old partner, I mean."

My real partner, that was what she wanted to say.

"He ok?"

She shrugged. "I guess so. You know how doctors are – they never give a definite answer."

"Anything I can do to help?"

She smiled, appreciating the offer from someone she hated for no reason besides that he wasn't someone else. "Keep the coffee coming and hand over all your paperwork."

"Yes, ma'am!" With a grin, he passed her a pile of file folders before he stood up to get her a fresh coffee. "You keep doing my paperwork and I'll do anything you want."

Paperwork was better than interacting with people when she was feeling like shit. And offering to do Matthew's, well, she figured she should try to get the guy to like her. They were partners, after all. And she wasn't going anywhere in the short term. No matter what Cragen had said. Elliot would jump at the chance to return to Special Victims.

Which meant that she couldn't. She couldn't do that to him.

She'd run him off. She'd thrown herself at him in the club that night. She'd chased him when he tried to leave. She'd kept trying to work with him, torturing his time at work, begging him over and over again to talk to her while he was trying to solve crimes. And then, when he'd accidentally bumped into her, she'd chased him off again, sending him running from a bar where he'd gone innocently to have a drink with his buddies.

He'd nearly died.

Just trying to get the fuck away from her.

She wouldn't do it again. She wouldn't follow him and chase him and try to trap him into a relationship he obviously didn't want to have.

And when Matthew brought her coffee to her, she promised herself it didn't taste any different just because someone else had handed it to her.

She smiled her thanks. "You already know how I take my coffee. Quick study."

"It's been two and a half weeks, Liv. That's enough time to figure out how someone takes their coffee."

She didn't bother to point out that she didn't know how he took his. She didn't know what he liked for lunch. She didn't know if he was married or single or gay. She couldn't even swear the M on his desk plate actually stood for Matthew.

There was nothing she could do about that at the moment, so she dove into piles of half finished forms, deciding to make herself seem valuable to her new partner somehow. She had to redeem herself. If he dumped her too, she'd take it personally.

With the help of a continuously refilled coffee cup, as well as quite a few ibuprofen tablets, Olivia managed to waste half the day without having to move. Her neck was starting to cramp, and she looked away from the forms, across the expanse of desk space. She had already started to smile, anticipating a warm smile, teasing blue eyes.

Instead she saw brown eyes that mirrored her own. She fought to keep smiling.

"I'm trying not to take it personally, but I swear, you always look disappointed when you see me." Matthew was joking, his wide smile assured her of that. He was a good looking guy in his late thirties, and certainly hadn't had the pain of rejection based on his looks alone.

She shrugged, hating that he already knew her well enough to read her, fearing that her disgust with the situation was really just that obvious. "I'm not very good with change, apparently. It's not you."

"Good to know. Ready for lunch? There's a place around the corner with the best fried chicken you've ever had."

Her stomach lurched and she didn't even try to hide the disappointment. Not only would Elliot have known better than to offer her fried chicken, he wouldn't have been so obnoxious as to suggest that he might eat it in front of her either.

"Not a chicken fan?"

She shook her head. "And you won't be if you get me started on what's in it."

"Any objection to burgers?" He looked quite hopeful, as though his entire happiness rested on whether or not he'd be having an artery-clogging meat-fest for lunch.

She gave in, reminding herself she needed to befriend the man. "Burgers are fine. No cheese on mine."

"I'll be back in a few." Matthew stood and grabbed his jacket off the back of his chair, disappearing through the door.

She stared after him, a creepy feeling of déjà vu washing over her.

Why was she always sitting there like an ass watching her partner leave?

* * * * *

Because she was an ass. That was why she was watching him storm away from her.

Because she was a stupid ass. That was why she jumped to her feet to chase him.

"El, wait!" She didn't care who heard her nor who recognized the desperation in her voice nor who had seen her trying to drag her partner into a conversation he'd been avoiding all morning, all week.

She chased him down the hall, up the steps, onto the roof. "Elliot, look at me."

"No! Jesus, Olivia, if I jumped right now, I bet you'd fucking follow me."

She tried to meet his eyes, but he stubbornly refused. "Yeah, I probably would."

"Leave me alone. I don't want to talk to you." He turned his back on her, something he'd been doing more and more as of late.

She didn't have any sense. Or any pride. Grabbing his arm, she tried to pull him around to look at her. "We need to talk about this."

He yanked his arm out of her grasp like she'd burned him. "The last thing we need to do is talk about it."

Undeterred, she moved around him, insinuating herself in front of him, fists closing around his suit coat to keep him from walking away. "We can't work like this. We have to talk about it." She hated the pathetic sound of her voice. But she hated the way he was denying her even more. "Please!"

His eyes locked on hers for a brief moment, his emotions hidden somewhere deep in the icy blue. "Olivia, back off! Get a god-damned grip on yourself. Nothing happened, ok? Just – " He tried to turn away, his cold hands pulling hers from his jacket. "Leave it. Let it go. If you want to work with me, we can't talk about it. Forget it happened."

Every word he said was ripping her apart, but she was sure she could get through to him. She hadn't been alone in the club that night.

"Stop it, Elliot! We can't pretend nothing happened." When he dodged her, she pushed in front of him once again, pressing her hands against his chest the way she had that night. "Damn it, Elliot, something did happen. We can either keep fighting about it or we can talk about it, but it's not going to go away!"

His hands found her shoulders and for one millisecond, she rejoiced, thinking she'd gotten through to him.

But then she felt the pressure, the force, as he shoved her back.

"Don't you fucking touch me!"

She refused to give in to the tears that wanted to spill. She tried to force her chin to stop trembling. But her pain showed through in her words, in the thought that she couldn't prevent pouring out of her mouth. "You didn't seem to mind me touching you the other night."

His eyes blazed hot for a moment, but quickly returned to the icy stare. "Fuck you." He turned, heading for the door, aiming to get back into the precinct where he knew she wouldn't dare continue the conversation.

"Elliot, don't do this!" She was frantic. She was weak. All she could do was block the door with her body, certain he wouldn't touch her again, not even to get away.

He sighed, his hands coming to rest on his hips, his eyes not looking at her. "I'm married. What do you want me to do? Dump my family because you couldn't control yourself when you were high?"

She couldn't stop the tears then. There were too many of them. They were falling too fast.

It hadn't just been her.

It couldn't have been.

He'd been there too.

But he was right.

His response had been purely physical, undeniable with the influence of the drugs no matter how much his mind might have resisted.

Her stomach churned. She'd forced him into a sexual encounter that he'd tried, at least in his mind, to resist. And rather than let him ignore it and forget it and pretend it hadn't happened, she was making him remember it, constantly bringing it up and demanding he discuss it with her like he'd been the one to instigate it.

She swallowed hard, wanting to apologize, wishing she could have stopped herself that night. She shook her head, telling herself that the fuzzy memory she treasured as proof of his feelings for her was wrong, that it was all a mistake, that he'd wanted nothing to do with her.

Purely physical. Just tension. Any woman in front of him would have been able to coax the same reaction from him.

She hated herself. She hated what she'd done to him, to them, to their partnership. She'd been confused, the drug had clouded her ability to understand, it had let her believe what she wanted to believe.

And she could have brushed it off, the same as he had, she could have pretended it was nothing. If only she hadn't said she loved him. God, she was such a stupid fuck.

She wanted to say she was sorry, but the words wouldn't come.

She nodded, giving into him the way she knew she always would in the end. "You're right. We shouldn't talk about it. We shouldn't talk at all."

She stepped aside, letting him disappear inside the building, leaving her feeling more alone than she ever had in her entire life.

And when she finally pulled herself together and crawled back to her desk, he was there, the same partner she'd known for years, the same man she'd fantasized about for so long, the same man who'd just broken her heart. Again.

And, once he finally noticed two days later, the bastard actually had the audacity to ask her why she wasn't speaking to him.

* * * * *

She had to make do with what she had. It was bad enough that she'd singlehandedly ruined their partnership. It was bad enough that she'd been a thorn in his side for those few precious days they'd had left as partners. It was bad enough that she'd nearly gotten him killed needling him in the bar that night.

She wasn't about to make him sorry he had survived by bugging him even more.

Those moments she had seen him that morning, knowing he was safe, being close to him without him getting upset, those were the last moments she would ever have with him. She wouldn't see him anymore. She wasn't going to stifle him anymore.

It was enough that he was ok.

It had to be.

"You all right?" Matthew was back, the white paper bag he'd meant to offer hanging limply at his side.

She'd always worn her heart on her sleeve; it was something she needed to work on. Keeping her feelings to herself was going to be her new special project.

She forced a smile and reached for the bag. "Back already?"

He wasn't quite convinced, his face revealing concern. "You sure you're ok?"

Nodding, she pulled her lunch out and started to unwrap it. "I'm fine."

Lying. That was the other thing she needed to work on. Maybe she could have avoided everything, all the trouble, if she'd been able to lie to Elliot and tell him she hadn't wanted to do what she did and she hadn't meant what she said. Elliot had always been able to see right through her and he'd known she was lying when she tried to make things right. Maybe if she learned to lie, then someday she would be able to trust herself enough to see Elliot again.

At least then she'd have something to live for.

Within the space of two weeks, she thought she was making progress. She remembered, most of the time, that Matthew liked cream and sugar in his coffee, though she occasionally lapsed and brought him a cup Elliot would have liked. She determined for sure that Matthew was actually his name. She happened upon a Mexican place down the street where they could both get something they liked for lunch. She'd even convinced her new squad that she was invaluable because not only did she have a way of convincing frightened witnesses to come forward, but she was also always up-to-date on her paperwork.

Luckily, keeping herself busy with befriending Matthew and ingratiating herself to her new boss left her little time to think about Elliot. Well, she had plenty of time to think, but her busy work schedule which was every bit as strenuous as Special Victims left her no time to actually act on any stupid thoughts she might have like calling him or going to visit. She'd even sworn off alcohol for the foreseeable future, knowing that it might make her rethink the policy of non-contact or weaken her resolve to stick to it.

In fact, specifically not giving in to any urge to contact her ex-partner became an activity in which she completely immersed herself, in much the same way anorexics find themselves wholly consumed with not eating.

And, she feared on some level that she refused to consciously acknowledge, it was about as healthy.


	9. Chapter 9

Part Nine

He had never been so lonely in all of his life.

Funny how damn busy and loud and full of people a terribly lonely life could be.

After his latest brush with death, during which he discovered once again that he was not bulletproof, just about everyone he had ever met stopped by to visit him. O'Bryan, Cragen, all of what was left of Special Victims, Warner, guys from the crime lab, even the partner he'd had three partners before Olivia. His mom had come to stay with them for a week after he was discharged. Maureen and Kathleen came home for dinner every night and stayed through till morning most of the time.

But there was one person who didn't come.

And that was the only person he actually wanted to see.

Every single day that went by, he knew it was that much less likely she'd suddenly show up, apologizing for some awful case that had kept her tied up and unable to visit.

Every single day that went by, his vague memory of seeing her there in his room, asleep by his bed, seemed more like wishful thinking, a wonderful dream produced by the pain killers he'd been pumped full of at the time.

He'd been so damn happy to see her that he hadn't thought about the utter impossibility that she would have been there. Who would have called her? O'Bryan didn't have a clue that his wife wasn't the person he needed to ground him. According to the NYPD, Kathy was the first person to be called. And she'd been there – that much he was sure about. Although he'd been unconscious during her first visit, he hadn't been so lucky for the subsequent ones.

In her role as the supportive wife of her wounded husband, she'd been there everyday, as long as the staff would let her stay, constantly fluffing his pillows or offering him another blanket or sneaking in food as soon as he'd been allowed to eat. She hovered around him, buzzing in his ear like a nagging bee, never giving him a moment to himself. The bullet that had torn through his abdomen had apparently erased her memory as well. She forgot that they fought more than they talked. She forgot that the subject of divorce had come up again. She forgot that on the nights Elliot was home, he usually slept on the couch. Between his reassignment and his injury, she seemed to think the slate full of trouble between them had been wiped clean.

Elliot wished that he'd had the same memory loss. He wished he could forget the way his heart had soared at the imagined sight of Olivia in his room. He wished that he didn't pray to hear her voice every time the phone rang.

He'd set up camp on the couch as soon as he'd come home, at first blaming his wound for his inability to set foot in the bedroom he'd shared with his wife for so many years. But as the days went by and he was strong enough to work out in the basement, he knew the time was limited before Kathy mentioned why the steps to the second floor were so much more daunting than those to the basement.

He didn't want to do it. He didn't want to discuss it. Kathy's selective amnesia was annoying, but not nearly as annoying as a pissed off Kathy would be when he flat refused to acknowledge what she'd believed to be a reset of the countdown clock on their marriage.

But he couldn't go back. He couldn't sleep in that bed with that woman and pretend he was happy to be living that life. He hadn't slept in their bed since the night in the club and, though at first he'd tried to convince himself it was to protect Kathy from ever finding out, from being hurt by what he'd allowed – fuck, by what he'd wanted and hoped and would have begged – Olivia to do, he knew his reticence to touch his wife wasn't about protecting her.

He didn't want to hurt Kathy, but his first priority was Olivia. He couldn't go back to his wife after her. There was nothing he could do about the fact that he'd been married when it had happened; he couldn't change the past. But he couldn't touch Kathy, he couldn't kiss Kathy, not anymore. Not after he'd been with Olivia.

Fuck, he'd never even kissed her.

Of all the things he'd fantasized about doing with Olivia over the years – and there had been enough – kissing was the thing that he dreamed of the most. Pathetic, he knew, since there were so many things to imagine, things like what had happened, but the kissing was special. Screwed up as their relationship was at any given moment, pressing his mouth against hers was the one thing he was always perfectly willing to do.

He wanted to kiss her, to feel her breath on his face, to taste her lips, to share that intimacy with her.

He'd wanted to kiss her so badly that night.

* * * * *

The moment she'd appeared at the top of the steps to the bullpen, he'd wanted to kiss her. He'd about had a heart attack over the amount of skin she was showing, but the desire to shield her body from all those pairs of eyes paled in comparison to the intense desire to kiss her.

And the desire hadn't faded at all while they'd been in the club. It had only grown stronger. He'd tried to work, damn it, he had. But as much as he knew he needed to be looking around, checking for people who looked like trouble, letting Olivia wander into the crowd to look for trouble herself.

But, jesus, how the fuck was he supposed to let go of her?

He'd leaned against the wall, trying to appear the slightly bored, disinterested escort of a club-hopping girlfriend. But she was pressed against him, head to toe, her whole body resting on him.

Although he could have claimed that he was just playing the part of any guy in his right mind with an opportunity to touch Olivia, he didn't bother. He wasn't holding her because it was part of his cover. In fact, stopping her from interacting with the other patrons was precisely not what he was supposed to be doing. He was supposed to be standing back, keeping an eye on her while she tried to be a target. Except his arms wouldn't release her. He couldn't stand the thought of letting go of her, certainly not if that meant encouraging someone else to touch her.

No, she was his. He was always protective of her. He was always possessive of her. Normally, he had to tamp down the urge to physically display that he felt she belonged to him. He wasn't about to let a chance to touch her pass him by; not when she was rubbing against him and welcoming what he knew she would have never allowed any other day.

His hands were on her bare skin, the silky soft feel of her driving him crazy. He loved having his hands on her. He wanted to have his mouth on her. He knew she would taste every bit as good as she felt. God, every single second he wanted to put his mouth on her a little bit more. He couldn't resist the occasional sample, letting his mouth brush against her neck.

She was intoxicating. The warmth of her body. The weight of her pressing into him. The feel of her skin. The smell of her neck, where he'd buried his face. He didn't even remembering he was supposed to be working.

He was supposed to be fucking her.

At least, that was all he could think he was supposed to do. His body said he should have taken her right there and then.

His mind couldn't think of a single reason why he shouldn't.

But before he had the chance to act on it, before he had to try to convince her, she had turned, her hands moving all over him, her eyes begging him to fuck her. He was mesmerized by her, her face, her body, her hands touching him.

He heard the voices in his ear, people talking to him, people yelling at him. Something was wrong.

Oh, right, he was hard as a rock and he wasn't buried inside of her yet.

Yes, that was quite a bit wrong. Not to worry, he was going to fix that.

And if he told her what he wanted to do to her, he suspected the people listening in might object. But they didn't really exist. Not anymore. All that existed was her and him and their need to touch.

He watched in amazement when her hands went to his belt, working the catch, popping open the button of his jeans, sliding his zipper open. For just a second, he looked at the wire concealed in his pocket and thought about telling them, for Olivia's benefit, to stop listening. But the thought evaporated when he felt her delicate hand sliding into his shorts.

Fuck.

He'd never in his life felt anything like her touch.

He'd wanted her so badly for so long that he couldn't quite believe it was finally happening. He couldn't believe she actually felt as good as he'd imagined she would.

He couldn't believe she was on her knees in front of him, wide eyes watching him as she pulled his dick free of the confines of his pants.

It positively blew his mind when her mouth closed around him. His head lolled back, his eyes closed to slits, only remaining open at all so that he could see the way he was tasting him.

There was nothing else, just her hot, wet mouth, her velvet tongue, her long fingers, her soft hair. His body was jumping, he was on fire, jerking from the electricity every place anything of hers touched anything of his.

He wanted to grab her and drag that mouth up to his. He wanted to taste her right then. He didn't get any further than reaching for her, his fingers twisting into the dark strands of her hair, just touching her, enjoying the feel of her while she pleasured him.

He wanted to fuck her, he remembered that quite suddenly. He wanted the chance to shove that little skirt up over her hips and stake his claim of her tight body right there in the middle of the club.

But he knew he wouldn't get the chance if she didn't stop.

And he couldn't possibly make her stop.

So he didn't.

Within seconds, he felt the world stop turning, his whole body exploding, his brain melting from the heat. He didn't know how the hell he was still on his feet.

His hands were still knotted in her hair, his thumbs brushing her cheeks, as she licked him clean, tucked him back in his pants, and closed everything back up.

He'd never felt love like he did at that moment, having watched her do something so completely selfless for him.

But his release had cleared his mind the slightest bit, allowing him to think for just a moment. What the fuck had they done? How fucking screwed up was what she'd just done?

He stared at her in shock as she stood, her body sliding up his, her arms circling around his waist, her mouth so close, her eyes locked on his. What was she thinking? Going down on him in public while they were working?

While they were _wired_?

She was out of her fucking mind.

But he could say anything, not with Cragen screaming in his ear.

She leaned forward, her face turned to the side, her lips grazing his ear.

"I love you."

Did she actually think they were going to keep going? With Cragen, fucking _Cragen_, listening in while they fucked?

Why not just fucking invite Kathy to come watch too?

Oh, fuck. Kathy. His _wife_. How could he face her? How could he tell her that her worst fucking nightmare had come to pass and he'd fucking loved every damn minute of it? He'd been having problems with her, but he'd given his word to her and he'd had every intention of keeping that promise until the marriage was over. No matter how much he'd fantasized about Olivia, he'd never intended to act on it.

He stared at Olivia, his eyes wide, sure she could read him as well as he'd always read her. She was the other woman. He felt so guilty. So awful. So disgusting. And Olivia was smiling, a small, satiated, happy smile.

Fuck. She'd seduced him. With that outfit. With her fucking perfect body. With her unfuckingbelievable mouth.

Their friendship, their partnership, was over. It had to be. He couldn't keep working with her. He couldn't keep looking at her.

He couldn't keep touching her like he hadn't done anything wrong.

He couldn't keep encouraging her and letting her know he'd loved every fucking minute of being unfaithful.

God, why where his hands still rubbing her back?

And what was Cragen talking about? A rape. Right, that's what they were there for. A rape. They were there because of a rape.

No, that's not what he was talking about. None of the reports were from kids.

Oh, _god_, Cragen's words cleared the guilty fog in his head, cleared the haze of confusion, cleared the post-sex euphoria.

Another woman, a girl, had been raped.

In the same room.

While Olivia had been sucking him off.

He was going to be sick.

He turned and ran, ignoring the voices in his ear, denying the distressed look on his partner's face, refusing to hear the way she called after him.

* * * * *

He'd blamed her for everything because the guilt was too much to bear. It was eating at him, every moment of every day. When she'd apologized to him, it had only made it worse, made him feel worse, for making her feel guilty too. He'd just wanted it to all go away, to erase it and pretend it hadn't happened. That way he wouldn't have to feel guilty for cheating on his wife. That way he wouldn't have to feel guilty for taking what he had from Olivia. That way they could stay friends and they could stay partners and he'd never have to deal with his own guilt.

He'd refused to acknowledge it. He'd refused to talk to her. He'd refused to tell her she hadn't done anything wrong.

Oh, god, he'd crushed her.

It was the benefit of hindsight that let him see what he'd done.

If only hindsight came with a time machine to set things right again.

It was no wonder she'd run from him. She always did when he hurt her.

He heard the voice asking what he was doing when he stood up and ran for the door. He saw the face watching him from the door as he backed his car into the street. But he ignored it.

If he could ignore the way Olivia had cried and said she loved him and begged him to talk to her, he could ignore the stare of the wife he wouldn't be married to for much longer.

He knew he probably scared the shit out of her with the harsh way he pounded on the door, but he was desperate. It seemed to take forever to get to her, like the way it had that night, and he was terrified someone might shoot him again to stop him from ever getting to her.

But rather than anger or hurt or confusion on her face when she opened the door, she looked utterly stupefied. And then there was the twenty she was offering him.

For a moment, he imagined he must have looked every bit as stupefied as she did.

"You're not the pizza man."

He shook his head, watching her carefully as she thought about whether to let him in. Finally, she turned away, her body moving with the door as she opened it.

She closed it behind him and turned to face him, but she didn't speak again. And she didn't look at him either.

There were so many things he wanted to say. There were so many things he wanted to do. And when his mouth opened, he was actually surprised by what his lips went with.

"Were you there that night in the hospital?" He watched her confusion as she realized he wasn't there to talk about what she feared. At least, he wasn't opening with that.

Her eyes moved to his as she nodded. When he didn't answer immediately, she tried to fill the silence, anticipating that he wanted an explanation. "Dispatch called Cragen and he decided to pick me up." Her eyes shifted away, lighting on everything in the room in rapid succession. "They said you were going to be ok and I figured you'd want to see your family, but no one else was there right then and I thought it would be ok."

But he heard what she was really saying. And that was what he answered.

"I kept looking for you." The way her face lit up at that tiny confession gave him the courage to continue. "I wanted to see you."

"They didn't mention you had memory loss." Her face fell, convinced the only way he might have wanted to see her was if he didn't remember.

He stepped forward, trying not to be hurt by the way she stepped back. He couldn't blame her. He'd done his share to make her afraid. "I was on my way back to talk to you when that bastard shot me."

"You were?"

"I was." He couldn't help but smile at the hope in her voice. "Actually, I was on my way back to tell you something that I'd figured out when I pulled my head out of my ass."

She stared at him, her curiosity hidden by the wary look in her eyes.

He stepped forward again, his hand reaching out to brush her cheek. Amazingly, she didn't pull away. "I love you too."

Tears welled in her eyes as she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. She looked down, pointlessly trying to hide her emotions from him. "I'm not going to bring it up again, Elliot. You wanted to stay friends and I should have respected that."

She opened her mouth to keep going, to keep trying to rationalize away what he was saying, but he pressed his fingers over her lips.

"Stop. That's not what I meant." His fingers moved under her chin, pulling her up to look at him. "I love you. I panicked when you said it and I fucked up bad more than once, but I love you and I don't mean as my partner."

She nodded at him. "That's convenient, since we're not partners anymore."

"Although we will be if Stephens has his way." That wasn't what he wanted, well, that wasn't all he wanted, but if he'd hurt her too badly to forgive him, he'd take what he could get.

She shook her head, losing the contact with his hand. "I don't want to go back. I loved Special Victims, but I can't do it. I like my new department, my new partner. I really don't think we should work together anymore."

If he was reading her right, and he usually was, she was telling the truth. But he couldn't believe she'd moved on so quickly, forgotten her feelings so easily.

"I'm not going to walk away this time. I'm not going to make that mistake anymore." His hand found her cheek again, stroking her skin. "I'm sorry I hurt you, Liv. Give me another chance."

It took a long time before her eyes locked on his again, and when they did, they were dark and full of warning. "So help me, El, I'll kill you if you fuck with me again."

"You won't have to. I'll kill myself."

And finally, she smiled at him, leaning her face against his hand. "I still love you, El, but you already know that, don't you?"

He nodded, realizing that he had known it; it had just been her forgiveness that he wasn't so sure of. "Can I kiss you?"

She grinned and nodded, her arms rising, her hands sliding over his shoulders. "Yes, please."

And then, he did what he'd wanted to for so long. His mouth pressed against hers, his lips touching hers, his tongue seeking entrance, her mouth granting it. He kissed her long and hard and tried to tell her all the things he couldn't find the words to say any other way.

A staccato knock on the door drove them apart long enough to breathe.

"That's the pizza, El." Her body didn't move away.

"That's too damn bad." He wasn't about to let her go that soon.

"But I'm hungry."

He closed his eyes and laughed, knowing only Olivia would still be thinking about her stomach. "Ok, ok." He relented only a little, stepping to the side with her still in his arms, just far enough to pull the door open and let her exchange the twenty for the pizza.

He fully expected her to drop the pizza and return to the kissing, but instead he watched in horror as she pried his arms away from her and headed for the kitchen.

"I meant it, El. I ordered a pizza because I was hungry, not for something to do."

He moved behind her as she sat down at the table, bending over to whisper in her ear. "Eat fast."

And then he sat beside her, trying not to find the way she ate pizza impossibly sexy.

Although, he suspected from the amused glint in her eyes, she was doing it on purpose.

~finis~


	10. Chapter 10

_AN: A brief epilogue to tie it all together._

Epilogue

He'd hadn't been following the case on the news, but it was hard to miss, between the TV coverage and little Kyle's face splashed across the front of every newspaper and magazine. The case had drawn national attention and he didn't envy Captain Stephens the anxiety and indigestion that always accompanied such a media frenzy.

He'd tried to ignore it, not because he didn't care, but simply because he didn't want to know when little Kyle's body was found, abused in terrible ways that ought to put people off their dinners but would instead be plastered over the same news rags as though the gory details of his murder were far more interesting than the fact that he played short stop for his little league team.

But he wasn't blind or deaf and so hadn't been so lucky as to avoid it.

And he was glad for that.

Because if there was one thing the media loved almost as much as a dead baby, it was a hero.

Because he couldn't have been prouder when he saw the photos of Elliot carrying the frightened, dirty boy from the shithole he'd been stashed in, not even if Elliot had been his own son.

And so, a year after he'd last set foot in Haggerty's on an entirely different occasion, Don found himself back there, pulling open the heavy wooden door.

He was surprised that Olivia wasn't there, even more so when Elliot introduced him to his partner. He hadn't even stuttered or tripped over the words like it had been a new development. His heart broke then, watching Elliot and his friends celebrating a tough case with a beautiful outcome. Andrew Stephens raised his glass, calling for a toast to Elliot and the commendation he'd earned. Don wasn't sure he'd be able to choke down a polite sip of his soda. He hadn't believed Elliot could ever be happy without Olivia at his side.

Elliot interrupted Stephens, telling him to wait.

Don didn't know what to make of that - he could have understood Elliot refusing it altogether, but postponing it seemed strange.

It wasn't so strange anymore a few minutes later when Haggerty's door opened again, revealing an absolutely radiant Olivia. She didn't hang back or watch quietly from the bar. No, instead she walked right through the hole the group created for her, stepping right up to Elliot.

"Sorry we're late." Her smile was so bright Don thought it seemed to light up the gloomy bar.

"That's ok. We waited." Elliot was smiling back.

And as he watched Elliot's arms wrapping around her, Don noticed for the first time that the thin gold band that had been on his hand for so many years was gone. And as he watched what he thought was going to be a hug quickly turn into an intimate kiss that no one else seemed surprised by, he noticed her hand where it lay against his face.

Rather he noticed what was on her hand. It was small, not designed to be flashy or get attention. But it sparkled in the light and Don smiled at it.

He knew they probably had no intention of getting married. It was simply a way for Elliot to mark her, to stake his claim on her when he wasn't around. And instead of balking at the idea, at the institution of marriage on the whole, Olivia wore the ring proudly.

He saw the way the four of them interacted with ease. Elliot and his partner, Olivia and her partner. Obviously they knew each other well, had spent time together. They were comfortable with someone else watching the other's back, something Don hadn't been sure would ever happen.

But then again, with the way Olivia leaned into him and the way Elliot kept his arm around her, he realized they were probably too happy with the way things had worked out to object.

And that time, when Stephens once again lifted his glass to Elliot, Don was proud to raise his as well.

He'd raised the kids right.


End file.
